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MY CHILDHOOD 



" Aleksyei Maksimovitch Pyeshkof (pseudonym 
Maxim Gorky). Born at Nijni-Novgorod, March 14, 
1868. He led a vagabond life for many years, working 
and tramping with the poorest classes in Russia, and his 
writings record the tragedy of poverty and crime as he 
found it. Among the best known of his works are 
'Makar Chudra ' (1890), ' Emilian Pibgai,' ' Chelkash,' 
'Oshybka' (1895), ' Tyenovya Kartinki ' (1895), 
' Toska,' ' Konovalov ' (1896), ' Malva ' ( 1896), ' Foma 
Gordyeev ' (1901), ' Mukiki ' (1901). Three volumes 
of short stories (1898—99), ' Miestchanye * (1902), 
'Comrades' (1907), 'The Spy' (1908), 'In the 
Depths,' a play, and ' Tales of Two Countries ' (1914)." 
— Century Cyclopedia of Names. 




maxim GORKY 



MY CHILDHOOD 



BY 

MAXIM GORKY 




NEW YORK 

THE CENTURY CO. 

1915 






?<K 



Copyright, 1915, by 
The Century Co. 



Published, October, /qij 



4 



V.2 



OCT 22 1915 
©CI. A * L6163 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

Maxim Gorky Frontispiece 



FACING 
PAGE 



He Dance Unweariedly, Oblivious of Everything . . 56 

The Sharing-out of the Family Goods 120 

When They Came Back from Church They Drank Tea 

in a Depressed Manner 315 

"Mother Sent Me to School . . . and from the First I 

Took a Dislike to It 332 



MY CHILDHOOD 



MY CHILDHOOD 



CHAPTER I 

IN a narrow, darkened room, my father, dressed in a 
white and unusually long garment, lay on the floor 
under the window. The toes of his bare feet were curi- 
ously extended, and the fingers of the still hands, which 
rested peacefully upon his breast, were curved; his 
merry eyes were tightly closed by the black disks of 
two copper coins; the light had gone out of his still 
face, and I was frightened by the ugly way he showed 
his teeth. 

My mother, only half clad in a red petticoat, knelt 
and combed my father's long, soft hair, from his brow 
to the nape of his neck, with the same black comb which 
I loved to use to tear the rind of watermelons; she 
talked unceasingly in her low, husky voice, and it 
seemed as if her swollen eyes must be washed away 
by the incessant flow of tears. 

Holding me by the hand was my grandmother, who 
had a big, round head, large eyes, and a nose like a 

3 



4 MY CHILDHOOD 

sponge — a dark, tender, wonderfully interesting person. 
She also was weeping, and her grief formed a fitting 
accompaniment to my mother's, as, shuddering the 
while, she pushed me towards my father; but I, terri- 
fied and uneasy, obstinately tried to hide myself 
against her. I had never seen grown-up people cry 
before, and I did not understand the words which my 
grandmother uttered again and again: 

"Say good-by to daddy. You will never see him 
any more. He is dead — before his time." 

I had been very ill, had only just left my bed in fact, 
and I remember perfectly well that at the beginning of 
my illness my father used to merrily bustle about me. 
Then he suddenly disappeared and his place was taken 
by my grandmother, a stranger to me. 

"Where did you come from*?" I asked her. 

"From up there, from Nijni," she answered; "but I 
did not walk here, I came by boat. One does not walk 
on water, you little imp. ,, 

This was ludicrous, incomprehensible, and untrue; 
upstairs there lived a bearded, gaudy Persian, and in 
the cellar an old, yellow Kalmuck who sold sheepskins. 
One could get upstairs by riding on the banisters, or if 
one fell that way, one could roll. I knew this by ex- 
perience. But where was there room for water? It 
was all untrue and delightfully muddled. 

"And why am I a little imp?" 



MY CHILDHOOD 5 

"Why? Because you are so noisy," she said, laugh- 
ing. 

She spoke sweetly, merrily, melodiously, and from 
the very first day I made friends with her ; all I wanted 
now was for her to make haste and take me out of that 
room. 

My mother pressed me to her; her tears and groans 
created in me a strange feeling of disquietude. It was 
the first time I had seen her like this. She had always 
appeared a stern woman of few words ; neat, glossy, and 
strongly built like a horse, with a body of almost sav- 
age strength, and terribly strong arms. But now she 
was swollen and palpitating, and utterly desolate. 
Her hair, which was always coiled so neatly about her 
head, with her large, gaily trimmed cap, was tumbled 
about her bare shoulders, fell over her face, and part 
of it which remained plaited, trailed across my 
father's sleeping face. Although I had been in the 
room a long time she had not once looked at me; she 
could do nothing but dress my father's hair, sobbing 
and choking with tears the while. 

Presently some swarthy gravediggers and a soldier 
peeped in at the door. 

The latter shouted angrily: 

"Clear out now ! Hurry up !" 

The window was curtained by a dark shawl, which 
the wind inflated like a sail. I knew this because one 



6 MY CHILDHOOD 

day my father had taken me out in a sailing-boat, and 
without warning there had come a peal of thunder. 
He laughed, and holding me against his knees, cried, 
"It is nothing. Don't be frightened, Luke!" 

Suddenly my mother threw herself heavily on the 
floor, but almost at once turned over on her back, drag- 
ging her hair in the dust; her impassive, white face 
had become livid, and showing her teeth like my father, 
she said in a terrible voice, "Close the door! . . . 
Alexis ... go away!" 

Thrusting me on one side, grandmother rushed to 
the door crying: 

"Friends ! Don't be frightened; don't interfere, but 
go away, for the love of Christ. This is not cholera 
but childbirth. . . . I beg of you to go, good peo- 
ple!" 

I hid myself in a dark corner behind a box, and 
thence I saw how my mother writhed upon the floor, 
panting and gnashing her teeth; and grandmother, 
kneeling beside her, talked lovingly and hopefully. 

"In the name of the Father and of the Son . . . ! 
Be patient, Varusha! Holy Mother of God! . . . 
Our Defense ... !" 

I was terrified. They crept about on the floor close 
to my father, touching him, groaning and shrieking, 
and he remained unmoved and actually smiling. This 
creeping about on the floor lasted a long time; several 



MY CHILDHOOD 7 

times my mother stood up, only to fall down again, 
and grandmother rolled in and out of the room like a 
large, black, soft ball. All of a sudden a child cried. 

"Thank God!" said grandmother. "It is a boy!" 
And she lighted a candle. 

I must have fallen asleep in the corner, for I remem- 
ber nothing more. 

The next impression which my memory retains is a 
deserted corner in a cemetery on a rainy day. I am 
standing by a slippery mound of sticky earth and 
looking into the pit wherein they have thrown the coffin 
of my father. At the bottom there is a quantity of 
water, and there are also frogs, two of which have even 
jumped on to the yellow lid of the coffin. 

At the graveside were myself, grandmother, a 
drenched sexton, and two cross gravediggers with 
shovels. 

We were all soaked with the warm rain which fell 
in fine drops like glass beads. 

"Fill in the grave," commanded the sexton, moving 
away. 

Grandmother began to cry, covering her face with 
a corner of the shawl which she wore for a head-cov- 
ering. The gravediggers, bending nearly double, be- 
gan to fling the lumps of earth on the coffin rapidly, 
striking the frogs, which were leaping against the sides 
of the pit, down to the bottom. 



8 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Come along, Lenia," said grandmother, taking hold 
of my shoulder; but having no desire to depart, I 
wriggled out of her hands. 

"What next, O Lord'?" grumbled grandmother, 
partly to me, and partly to God, and she remained for 
some time silent, with her head drooping dejectedly. 

The grave was filled in, yet still she stood there, 
till the gravediggers threw their shovels to the ground 
with a resounding clangor, and a breeze suddenly 
arose and died away, scattering the raindrops ; then she 
took me by the hand and led me to a church some dis- 
tance away, by a path which lay between a number of 
dark crosses. 

"Why don't you cry*?" she asked, as we came away 
from the burial-ground. "You ought to cry." 

"I don't want to," was my reply. 

"Well, if you don't want to, you need not," she said 
gently. 

This greatly surprised me, because I seldom cried, 
and when I did it was more from anger than sorrow; 
moreover, my father used to laugh at my tears, while 
my mother would exclaim, "Don't you dare to cry!" 

After this we rode in a droshky through a broad but 
squalid street, between rows of houses which were 
painted dark red. 

As we went along, I asked grandmother, "Will those 
frogs ever be able to get out?" 



MY CHILDHOOD 9 

"Never !" she answered. "God bless them !" 
I reflected that my father and my mother never 
spoke so often or so familiarly of God. 

A few days later my mother and grandmother 
took me aboard a steamboat, where we had a tiny 
cabin. 

My little brother Maxim was dead, and lay on a 
table in the corner, wrapped in white and wound about 
with red tape. Climbing on to the bundles and trunks 
I looked out of the porthole, which seemed to me ex- 
actly like the eye of a horse. Muddy, frothy water 
streamed unceasingly down the pane. Once it 
dashed against the glass with such violence that it 
splashed me, and I involuntarily jumped back to the 
floor. 

"Don't be afraid," said grandmother, and lifting 
me lightly in her kind arms, restored me to my place 
on the bundles. 

A gray, moist fog brooded over the water; from 
time to time a shadowy land was visible in the distance, 
only to be obscured again by the fog and the foam. 
Everything about us seemed to vibrate, except my 
mother who, with her hands folded behind her head, 
leaned against the wall fixed and still, with a face that 
was grim and hard as iron, and as expressionless. 
Standing thus, mute, with closed eyes, she appeared to 



io MY CHILDHOOD 

me as an absolute stranger. Her very frock was un- 
familiar to me. 

More than once grandmother said to her softly, 
"Varia, won't you have something to eat?" 

My mother neither broke the silence nor stirred 
from her position. 

Grandmother spoke to me in whispers, but to my 
mother she spoke aloud, and at the same time cau- 
tiously and timidly, and very seldom. I thought she 
was afraid of her, which was quite intelligible, and 
seemed to draw us closer together. 

"Saratov !" loudly and fiercely exclaimed my mother 
with startling suddenness. "Where is the sailor?" 

Strange, new words to me! Saratov? Sailor? 

A broad-shouldered, gray-headed individual dressed 
in blue now entered, carrying a small box which grand- 
mother took from him, and in which she proceeded to 
place the body of my brother. Having done this she 
bore the box and its burden to the door on her out- 
stretched hands; but, alas! being so stout she could 
only get through the narrow doorway of the cabin 
sideways, and now halted before it in ludicrous uncer- 
tainty. 

"Really, Mama!" exclaimed my mother impa- 
tiently, taking the tiny coffin from her. Then they 
both disappeared, while I stayed behind in the cabin 
regarding the man in blue. 



MY CHILDHOOD n 

"Well, mate, so the little brother has gone?" he 
said, bending down to me. 

"Who are you?" 

"I am a sailor." 

"And who is Saratov?" 

"Saratov is a town. Look out of the window. 
There it is !" 

Observed from the window, the land seemed to 
oscillate; and revealing itself obscurely and in a frag- 
mentary fashion, as it lay steaming in the fog, it re- 
minded me of a large piece of bread just cut off a hot 
loaf. 

"Where has grandmother gone to?" 

"To bury her little grandson." 

"Are they going to bury him in the ground?" 

"Yes, of course they are." 

I then told the sailor about the live frogs that had 
been buried with my father. 

He lifted me up, and hugging and kissing me, cried, 
"Oh, my poor little fellow, you don't understand. It 
is not the frogs who are to be pitied, but your mother. 
Think how she is bowed down by her sorrow." 

Then came a resounding howl overhead. Having 
already learned that it was the steamer which made 
this noise, I was not afraid; but the sailor hastily set 
me down on the floor and darted away, exclaiming, 
"I must run!" 



12 MY CHILDHOOD 

The desire to escape seized me. I ventured out of 
the door. The dark, narrow space outside was empty, 
and not far away shone the brass on the steps of the 
staircase. Glancing upwards, I saw people with wal- 
lets and bundles in their hands, evidently going off the 
boat. This meant that I must go off too. 

But when I appeared in front of the gangway, 
amidst the crowd of peasants, they all began to yell 
at me. 

"Who does he belong to*? Who do you belong 
to?' 

No one knew. 

For a long time they jostled and shook and poked 
me about, until the gray-haired sailor appeared and 
seized me, with the explanation: 

"It is the Astrakhan boy from the cabin." 

And he ran off with me to the cabin, deposited me 
on the bundles and went away, shaking his finger at 
me, as he threatened, "I '11 give you something!" 

The noise overhead became less and less. The boat 
had ceased to vibrate, or to be agitated by the motion 
of the water. The window of the cabin was shut in 
by damp walls; within it was dark, and the air was 
stifling. It seemed to me that the very bundles grew 
larger and began to press upon me; it was all horrible, 
and I began to wonder if I was going to be left alone 
forever in that empty boat. 



MY CHILDHOOD 13 

I went to the door, but it would not open ; the brass 
handle refused to turn, so I took a bottle of milk and 
with all my force struck at it. The only result was 
that the bottle broke and the milk spilled over my 
legs, and trickled into my boots. Crushed by this fail- 
ure, I threw myself on the bundles crying softly, and 
so fell asleep. 

When I awoke the boat was again in motion, and 
the window of the cabin shone like the sun. 

Grandmother, sitting near me, was combing her 
hair and muttering something with knitted brow. 
She had an extraordinary amount of hair which fell 
over her shoulders and breast to her knees, and even 
touched the floor. It was blue-black. Lifting it up 
from the floor with one hand and holding it with diffi- 
culty, she introduced an almost toothless wooden comb 
into its thick strands. Her lips were twisted, her dark 
eyes sparkled fiercely, while her face, encircled in that 
mass of hair, looked comically small. Her expression 
was almost malignant, but when I asked her why she 
had such long hair she answered in her usual mellow, 
tender voice : 

"Surely God gave it to me as a punishment. . . . 
Even when it is combed, just look at it! . . . When 
I was young I was proud of my mane, but now I am 
old I curse it. But you go to sleep. It is quite early. 
The sun has only just risen." 



i 4 MY CHILDHOOD 

"But I don't want to go to sleep again." 

"Very well, then don't go to sleep," she agreed at 
once, plaiting her hair and glancing at the berth on 
which my mother lay rigid, with upturned face. 
"How did you smash that bottle last evening? Tell 
me about it quietly." 

So she always talked, using such peculiarly harmo- 
nious words that they took root in my memory like 
fragrant, bright, everlasting flowers. When she smiled 
the pupils of her dark, luscious eyes dilated and 
beamed with an inexpressible charm, and her strong 
white teeth gleamed cheerfully. Apart from her mul- 
titudinous wrinkles and her swarthy complexion, she 
had a youthful and brilliant appearance. What 
spoiled her was her bulbous nose, with its distended 
nostrils, and red lips, caused by her habit of taking 
pinches of snuff from her black snuff-box mounted with 
silver, and by her fondness for drink. Everything 
about her was dark, but within she was luminous with 
an inextinguishable, joyful and ardent flame, which 
revealed itself in her eyes. Although she was bent, 
almost humpbacked, in fact, she moved lightly and 
softly, for all the world like a huge cat, and was just 
as gentle as that caressing animal. 

Until she came into my life I seemed to have been 
asleep, and hidden away in obscurity; but when she 
appeared she woke me and led me to the light of day. 



MY CHILDHOOD 15 

Connecting all my impressions by a single thread, she 
wove them into a pattern of many colors, thus making 
herself my friend for life, the being nearest my heart, 
the dearest and best known of all; while her disinter- 
ested love for all creation enriched me, and built up 
the strength needful for a hard life. 

• •<•■«•• 

Forty years ago boats traveled slowly; we were 
a long time getting to Nijni, and I shall never forget 
those days almost overladen with beauty. 

Good weather had set in. From morning till night 
I was on the deck with grandmother, under a clear sky, 
gliding between the autumn-gilded shores of the Volga, 
without hurry, lazily; and, with many resounding 
groans, as she rose and fell on the gray-blue water, a 
barge attached by a long rope was being drawn along 
by the bright red steamer. The barge was gray, and 
reminded me of a wood-louse. 

Unperceived, the sun floated over the Volga. 
Every hour we were in the midst of fresh scenes; the 
green hills rose up like rich folds on earth's sumptuous 
vesture; on the shore stood towns and villages; the 
golden autumn leaves floated on the water. 

"Look how beautiful it all is!" grandmother ex- 
claimed every minute, going from one side of the boat 
to the other, with a radiant face, and eyes wide with 
joy. Very often, gazing at the shore, she would for- 



16 MY CHILDHOOD 

get me ; she would stand on the deck, her hands folded 
on her breast, smiling and in silence, with her eyes full 
of tears. I would tug at her skirt of dark, sprigged 
linen. 

"Ah!" she would exclaim, starting. "I must have 
fallen asleep, and begun to dream." 

"fiut why are you crying?" 

"For joy and for old age, my dear," she would reply, 
smiling. "I am getting old, you know — sixty years 
have passed over my head." 

And taking a pinch of snuff, she would begin to tell 
me some wonderful stories about kind-hearted brig- 
ands, holy people, and all sorts of wild animals and 
evil spirits. 

She would tell me these stories softly, mysteriously, 
with her face close to mine, fixing me with her dilated 
eyes, thus actually infusing into me the strength which 
was growing within me. The longer she spoke, or 
rather sang, the more melodiously flowed her words. 
It was inexpressibly pleasant to listen to her. 

I would listen and beg for another, and this is what 
I got: 

"In the stove there lives an old goblin; once he got 
a splinter into his paw, and rocked to and fro whim- 
pering, 'Oh, little mice, it hurts very much; oh, little 
mice, I can't bear it!' " 

Raising her foot, she took it in her hands and 



MY CHILDHOOD 17 

wagged it from side to side, wrinkling up her face 
so funnily, just as if she herself had been hurt. 

The sailors who stood round — bearded, good-natured 
men — listening and laughing, and praising the stories, 
would say: 

"Now, Grandmother, give us another." 

Afterwards they would say: 

"Come and have supper with us." 

At supper they regaled her with vodka, and me 
with water-melon; this they did secretly, for there 
went to and fro on the boat a man who forbade the 
eating of fruit, and used to take it away and throw 
it in the river. He was dressed like an official, and 
was always drunk; people kept out of his sight. 

On rare occasions my mother came on deck, and 
stood on the side farthest from us. She was always 
silent. Her large, well-formed body, her grim face, 
her heavy crown of plaited, shining hair — all about 
her was compact and solid, and she appeared to me as 
if she were enveloped in a fog or a transparent cloud, 
out of which she looked unamiably with her gray 
eyes, which were as large as grandmother's. 

Once she exclaimed sternly: 

"People are laughing at you, Mama!" 

"God bless them!" answered grandmother, quite 
unconcerned. "Let them laugh, and good luck to 



18 MY CHILDHOOD 

I remember the childish joy grandmother showed at 
the sight of Nijni. Taking my hand, she dragged me 
to the side, crying: 

"Look! Look how beautiful it is! That's Nijni, 
that is ! There 's something heavenly about it. Look 
at the church too. Does n't it seem to have wings?" 
And she turned to my mother, nearly weeping. "Var- 
usha, look, won't you? Come here! You seem to 
have forgotten all about it. Can't you show a little 
gladness?" 

My mother, with a frown, smiled bitterly. 

When the boat arrived outside the beautiful town 
between two rivers blocked by vessels, and bristling 
with hundreds of slender masts, a large boat containing 
many people was drawn alongside it. Catching the 
boat-hook in the gangway, one after another the pas- 
sengers came on board. A short, wizened man, dressed 
in black, with a red-gold beard, a bird-like nose, and 
green eyes, pushed his way in front of the others. 

"Papa !" my mother cried in a hoarse, loud voice, as 
she threw herself into his arms; but he, taking her face 
in his little red hands and hastily patting her cheeks, 
cried : 

"Now, silly! What's the matter with you? . . ." 

Grandmother embraced and kissed them all at once, 
turning round and round like a peg-top; she pushed me 
towards them, saying quickly: 



MY CHILDHOOD 19 

"Now — make haste! This is Uncle Michael, this 
is Jaakov, this is Aunt Natalia, these are two brothers 
both called Sascha, and their sister Katerina. This 
is all our family. Is n't it a large one*?" 

Grandfather said to her: 

"Are you quite well, Mother?" and they kissed each 
other three times. 

He then drew me from the dense mass of people, and 
laying his hand on my head, asked: 

"And who may you be?" 

"I am the Astrakhan boy from the cabin." 

"What on earth is he talking about?" Grandfather 
turned to my mother, but without waiting for an an- 
swer, shook me and said : "You are a chip of the old 
block. Get into the boat." 

Having landed, the crowd of people wended its way 
up the hill by a road paved with rough cobblestones 
between two steep slopes covered with trampled 
grass. 

Grandfather and mother went in front of us all. 
He was a head shorter than she was, and walked with 
little hurried steps; while she, looking down on him 
from her superior height, appeared literally to float 
beside him. After them walked dark, sleek-haired 
Uncle Michael, wizened like grandfather, bright and 
curly-headed Jaakov, some fat women in brightly col- 
ored dresses, and six children, all older than myself 



20 MY CHILDHOOD 

and all very quiet. I was with grandmother and little 
Aunt Natalia. Pale, blue-eyed and stout, she fre- 
quently stood still, panting and whispering: 

"Oh, I can't go any farther!" 

"Why did they trouble you to come?" grumbled 
grandmother angrily. "They are a silly lot!" 

I did not like either the grown-up people nor the 
children; I felt myself to be a stranger in their midst 
— even grandmother had somehow become estranged 
and distant. 

Most of all I disliked my uncle; I felt at once that 
he was my enemy, and I was conscious of a certain feel- 
ing of cautious curiosity towards him. 

We had now arrived at the end of our journey. 

At the very top, perched on the right slope, stood the 
first building in the street — a squat, one-storied house, 
decorated with dirty pink paint, with a narrow over- 
hanging roof and bow-windows. Looked at from the 
street it appeared to be a large house, but the interior, 
with its gloomy, tiny rooms, was cramped. Every- 
where, as on the landing-stage, angry people strove 
together, and a vile smell pervaded the whole place. 

I went out into the yard. That also was unpleas- 
ant. It was strewn with large, wet cloths and lum- 
bered with tubs, all containing muddy water, of the 
same hue, in which other cloths lay soaking. In the 
corner of a half-tumbled-down shed the logs burned 



MY CHILDHOOD 21 

brightly in a stove, upon which something was boiling 
or baking, and an unseen person uttered these strange 
words : 

"Santaline, fuchsin, vitriol !" 



CHAPTER II 

THEN began and flowed on with astonishing 
rapidity an intense, varied, inexpressibly strange 
life. It reminded me of a crude story, well told by a 
good-natured but irritatingly truthful genius. Now, 
in recalling the past, I myself find it difficult to believe, 
at this distance of time, that things really were as they 
were, and I have longed to dispute or reject the facts — 
the cruelty of the drab existence of an unwelcome rela- 
tion is too painful to contemplate. But truth is 
stronger than pity, and besides, I am writing not about 
myself but about that narrow, stifling environment of 
unpleasant impressions in which lived — aye, and to this 
day lives — the average Russian of this class. 

My grandfather's house simply seethed with mutual 
hostility; all the grown people were infected and even 
the children were inoculated with it. I had learned, 
from overhearing grandmother's conversation, that my 
mother arrived upon the very day when her brothers 
demanded the distribution of the property from their 
father. Her unexpected return made their desire for 
this all the keener and stronger, because they were 
afraid that my mother would claim the dowry intended 

22 



MY CHILDHOOD 23 

for her, but withheld by my grandfather because she 
had married secretly and against his wish. My uncles 
considered that this dowry ought to be divided amongst 
them all. Added to this, they had been quarreling 
violently for a long time among themselves as to who 
should open a workshop in the town, or on the Oka 
in the village of Kunavin. 

One day, very shortly after our arrival, a quarrel 
broke out suddenly at dinner-time. My uncles started 
to their feet and, leaning across the table, began to 
shout and yell at grandfather, snarling and shaking 
themselves like dogs; and grandfather, turning very 
red, rapped on the table with a spoon and cried in a 
piercing tone of voice, like the crowing of a cock: "I 
will turn you out of doors !" 

With her face painfully distorted, grandmother said : 
"Give them what they ask, Father; then you will have 
some peace." 

"Be quiet, simpleton !" shouted my grandfather with 
flashing eyes; and it was wonderful, seeing how small 
he was, that he could yell with such deafening effect. 

My mother rose from the table, and going calmly to 
the window, turned her back upon us all. 

Suddenly Uncle Michael struck his brother on the 
face with the back of his hand. The latter, with a 
howl of rage, grappled with him; both rolled on the 
floor growling, gasping for breath and abusing each 



24 MY CHILDHOOD 

other. The children began to cry, and my Aunt 
Natalia, who was with child, screamed wildly; my 
mother seized her round the body and dragged her 
somewhere out of the way; the lively little nursemaid, 
Eugenia, drove the children out of the kitchen; chairs 
were knocked down; the young, broad-shouldered fore- 
man, Tsiganok, sat on Uncle Michael's back, while the 
head of the works, Gregory Ivanovitch, a bald-headed, 
bearded man with colored spectacles, calmly bound up 
my uncle's hands with towels. 

Turning his head and letting his thin, straggly, 
black beard trail on the floor, Uncle Michael cursed 
horribly, and grandfather, running round the table, ex- 
claimed bitterly: "And these are brothers! . . . 
Blood relations ! . . . Shame on you !" 

At the beginning of the quarrel I had jumped on to 
the stove in terror; and thence, with painful amaze- 
ment, I had watched grandmother as she washed Uncle 
Jaakov's battered face in a small basin of water, while 
he cried and stamped his feet, and she said in a sad 
voice: "Wicked creatures! You are nothing better 
than a family of wild beasts. When will you come 
to your senses?" 

Grandfather, dragging his torn shirt over his shoul- 
der, called out to her: "So you have brought wild 
animals into the world, eh, old woman 4 ?" 

When Uncle Jaakov went out, grandmother retired 



MY CHILDHOOD 25 

to a corner and, quivering with grief, prayed : "Holy 
Mother of God, bring my children to their senses." 

Grandfather stood beside her, and, glancing at the 
table, on which everything was upset or spilled, said 
softly : 

"When you think of them, Mother, and then of the 
little one they pester Varia about . . . who has the 
best nature?" 

"Hold your tongue, for goodness' sake! Take off 
that shirt and I will mend it. . . ." And laying the 
palms of her hands on his head, grandmother kissed 
his forehead; and he — so small compared to her — 
pressing his face against her shoulder, said: 

"We shall have to give them their shares, Mother, 
that is plain." 

"Yes, Father, it will have to be done." 

Then they talked for a long time; amicably at first, 
but it was not long before grandfather began to scrape 
his feet on the floor like a cock before a fight, and 
holding up a threatening finger to grandmother, said in 
a fierce whisper : 

"I know you ! You love them more than me. . . . 
And what is your Mischka? — a Jesuit ! And Jaaschka 
— a Freemason! And they live on me. . . . 
Hangers-on ! That is all they are." 

Uneasily turning on the stove, I knocked down an 
iron, which fell with a crash like a thunder-clap. 



26 MY CHILDHOOD 

Grandfather jumped up on the step, dragged me 
down, and stared at me as if he now saw me for the 
first time. 

"Who put you on the stove? Your mother?" 

"I got up there by myself." 

"You are lying!" 

"No I 'm not. I did get up there by myself. I was 
frightened." 

He pushed me away from him, lightly striking me 
on the head with the palm of his hand. 

"Just like your father! Get out of my sight!" 

And I was only too glad to run out of the kitchen. 



I was very well aware that grandfather's shrewd, 
sharp green eyes followed me everywhere, and I was 
afraid of him. I remember how I always wished to 
hide myself from that fierce glance. It seemed to me 
that grandfather was malevolent ; he spoke to every one 
mockingly and offensively, and, being provocative, did 
his best to put every one else out of temper. 

"Ugh! Tou!" he exclaimed frequently. 

The long-drawn-out sound "U-gh !" always reminds 
me of a sensation of misery and chill. In the recrea- 
tion hour, the time for evening tea, when he, my uncles 
and the workmen came into the kitchen from the work- 
shop weary, with their hands stained with santaline 



MY CHILDHOOD 27 

and burnt by sulphuric acid, their hair bound with 
linen bands, all looking like the dark-featured icon in 
the corner of the kitchen — in that hour of dread my 
grandfather used to sit opposite to me, arousing the 
envy of the other grandchildren by speaking to me 
oftener than to them. Everything about him was 
trenchant and to the point. His heavy satin waistcoat 
embroidered with silk was old; his much-scrubbed shirt 
of colored cotton was crumpled ; great patches flaunted 
themselves on the knees of his trousers; and yet he 
seemed to be dressed with more cleanliness and more 
refinement than his sons, who wore false shirtfronts 
and silk neckties. 

Some days after our arrival he set me to learn the 
prayers. All the other children were older than my- 
self, and were already being taught to read and write 
by the clerk of Uspenski Church. Timid Aunt Natalia 
used to teach me softly. She was a woman with a 
childlike countenance, and such transparent eyes that 
it seemed to me that, looking into them, one might see 
what was inside her head. I loved to look into those 
eyes of hers without shifting my gaze and without 
blinking; they used to twinkle as she turned her head 
away and said very softly, almost in a whisper: 
"That will do. . . . Now please say 'Our Father, 
which art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name. . . .' " 
And if I asked, "What does 'hallowed be Thy name' 



28 MY CHILDHOOD 

mean?" she would glance round timidly and admonish 
me thus: "Don't ask questions. It is wrong. Just 
say after me 'Our Father . . .' " 

Her words troubled me. Why was it wrong to ask 
questions? The words "hallowed be Thy name" ac- 
quired a mysterious significance in my mind, and I pur- 
posely mixed them up in every possible way. 

But my aunt, pale and almost exhausted, patiently 
cleared her throat, which was always husky, and said, 
"No, that is not right. Just say 'hallowed be Thy 
name.' It is plain enough." 

But my aunt, pale and almost exhausted, patiently 
irritated me, and hindered me from remembering the 
prayer. 

One day my grandfather inquired: 

"Well, Oleysha, what have you been doing to-day? 
Playing? The bruises on your forehead told me as 
much. Bruises are got cheaply. And how about 'Our 
Father 5 ? Have you learnt it?" 

"He has a very bad memory," said my aunt softly. 

Grandfather smiled as if he were glad, lifting his 
sandy eyebrows. "And what of it? He must be 
whipped; that's all." 

And again he turned to me. 

"Did your father ever whip you?" 

As I did not know what he was talking about, I was 
silent, but my mother replied: 



MY CHILDHOOD 29 

"No, Maxim never beat him, and what is more, for- 
bade me to do so." 

"And why, may I ask?" 

"He said that beating is not education." 

"He was a fool about everything — that Maxim. 
May God forgive me for speaking so of the dead!" 
exclaimed grandfather distinctly and angrily. He 
saw at once that these words enraged me. "What is 
that sullen face for?" he asked. "Ugh! . . . Ton! 
. . ." And smoothing down his reddish, silver- 
streaked hair, he added: "And this very Saturday I 
am going to give Sascha a hiding." 

"What is a hiding?" I asked. 

They all laughed, and grandfather said: "Wait a 
bit, and you shall see." 

In secret I pondered over the word "hiding." Ap- 
parently it had the same meaning as to whip and beat. 
I had seen people beat horses, dogs and cats, and in 
Astrakhan the soldiers used to beat the Persians; but 
I had never before seen any one beat little children. 
Yet here my uncles hit their own children over the 
head and shoulders, and they bore it without resent- 
ment, merely rubbing the injured part; and if I asked 
them whether they were hurt, they always answered 
bravely : 

"No, not a bit." 

Then there was the famous story of the thimble. 



30 MY CHILDHOOD 

In the evenings, from tea-time to supper-time, my 
uncles and the head workman used to sew portions of 
dyed material into one piece, to which they affixed 
tickets. Wishing to play a trick on half -blind Greg- 
ory, Uncle Michael had told his nine-year-old nephew 
to make his thimble red-hot in the candle-flame. 
Sascha heated the thimble in the snuffers, made it abso- 
lutely red-hot, and contriving, without attracting at- 
tention, to place it close to Gregory's hand, hid himself 
by the stove; but as luck would have it, grandfather 
himself came in at that very moment and, sitting down 
to work, slipped his finger into the red-hot thimble. 

Hearing the tumult, I ran into the kitchen, and I 
shall never forget how funny grandfather looked nurs- 
ing his burnt finger as he jumped about and shrieked: 

"Where is the villain who played this trick ?" 

Uncle Michael, doubled up under the table, snatched 
up the thimble and blew upon it; Gregory uncon- 
cernedly went on sewing, while the shadows played on 
his enormous bald patch. Then Uncle Jaakov rushed 
in, and, hiding himself in the corner by the stove, stood 
there quietly laughing; grandmother busied herself 
with grating up raw potatoes. 

"Sascha Jaakov did it!" suddenly exclaimed Uncle 
Michael. 

"Liar!" cried Jaakov, darting out from behind the 
stove. 



MY CHILDHOOD 31 

But his son, from one of the corners, wept and 
wailed : 

"Papa! don't believe him. He showed me how 
to do it himself." 

My uncles began to abuse each other, but grand- 
father all at once grew calm, put a poultice of grated 
potatoes on his finger, and silently went out, taking me 
with him. 

They all said that Uncle Michael was to blame. I 
asked naturally if he would be whipped, or get a hid- 
ing. 

"He ought to," answered grandfather, with a side- 
long glance at me. 

Uncle Michael, striking his hand upon the table, 
bawled at my mother : "Varvara, make your pup hold 
his jaw before I knock his head off." 

"Go on, then; try to lay your hands on him!" re- 
plied my mother. And no one said another word. 

She had a gift of pushing people out of her way, 
brushing them aside as it were, and making them feel 
very small by a few brief words like these. It was 
perfectly clear to me that they were all afraid of her; 
even grandfather spoke to her more quietly than he 
spoke to the others. It gave me great satisfaction to 
observe this, and in my pride I used to say openly to 
my cousins : "My mother is a match for all of them." 
And they did not deny it. 



32 MY CHILDHOOD 

But the events which happened on Saturday dimin- 
ished my respect for my mother. 

By Saturday I also had had time to get into trouble. 
I was fascinated by the ease with which the grown-up 
people changed the color of different materials; they 
took something yellow, steeped it in black dye, and it 
came out dark blue. They laid a piece of gray stuff in 
reddish water and it was dyed mauve. It was quite 
simple, yet to me it was inexplicable. I longed to dye 
something myself, and I confided my desire to Sascha 
Yaakovitch, a thoughtful boy, always in favor with 
his elders, always good-natured, obliging, and ready to 
wait upon every one. 

The adults praised him highly for his obedience and 
his cleverness, but grandfather looked on him with no 
favorable eye, and used to say: 

"An artful beggar that!" 

Thin and dark, with prominent, watchful eyes, 
Sascha Yaakov used to speak in a low, rapid voice, as 
if his words were choking him, and all the while he 
talked he glanced fearfully from side to side as if he 
were ready to run away and hide himself on the slight- 
est pretext. The pupils of his hazel eyes were sta- 
tionary except when he was excited, and then they be- 
came merged into the whites. I did not like him. I 
much preferred the despised idler, Sascha Michail- 



MY CHILDHOOD 33 

ovitch. He was a quiet boy, with sad eyes and a pleas- 
ing smile, very like his kind mother. He had ugly, 
protruding teeth, with a double row in the upper jaw; 
and being very greatly concerned about this defect, he 
constantly had his fingers in his mouth, trying to loosen 
his back ones, very amiably allowing any one who 
chose to inspect them. But that was the only inter- 
esting thing about him. He lived a solitary life in a 
house swarming with people, loving to sit in the dim 
corners in the daytime, and at the window in the eve- 
ning; quite happy if he could remain without speak- 
ing, with his face pressed against the pane for hours 
together, gazing at the flock of jackdaws which, now 
rising high above it, now sinking swiftly earthwards, in 
the red evening sky, circled round the dome of Uspen- 
ski Church, and finally, obscured by an opaque black 
cloud, disappeared somewhere, leaving a void behind 
them. When he had seen this he had no desire to speak 
of it, but a pleasant languor took possession of him. 

Uncle Jaakov's Sascha, on the contrary, could talk 
about everything fluently and with authority, like a 
grown-up person. Hearing of my desire to learn the 
process of dyeing, he advised me to take one of the best 
white tablecloths from the cupboard and dye it blue. 

"White always takes the color better, I know," he 
said very seriously. 

I dragged out a heavy tablecloth and ran with it to 



34 MY CHILDHOOD 

the yard, but I had no more than lowered the hem of 
it into the vat of dark-blue dye when Tsiganok flew at 
me from somewhere, rescued the cloth, and wringing it 
out with his rough hands, cried to my cousin, who had 
been looking on at my work from a safe place: 

"Call your grandmother quickly." 

And shaking his black, dishevelled head ominously, 
he said to me : 

"You '11 catch it for this." 

Grandmother came running on to the scene, wailing, 
and even weeping, at the sight, and scolded me in her 
ludicrous fashion: 

"Oh, you young pickle ! I hope you will be spanked 
for this." 

Afterwards, however, she said to Tsiganok: "You 
need n't say anything about this to grandfather, Vanka. 
I '11 manage to keep it from him. Let us hope that 
something will happen to take up his attention." 

Vanka replied in a preoccupied manner, drying his 
hands on his multi-colored apron: 

"Me? I shan't tell: but you had better see that 
that Sascha does n't go and tell tales." 

"I will give him something to keep him quiet," said 
grandmother, leading me into the house. 

On Saturday, before vespers, I was called into the 
kitchen, where it was all dark and still. I remember 
the closely shut doors of the shed and of the room, 



MY CHILDHOOD 35 

and the gray mist of an autumn evening, and the 
heavy patter of rain. Sitting in front of the stove on 
a narrow bench, looking cross and quite unlike him- 
self, was Tsiganok; grandfather, standing in the chim- 
ney corner, was taking long rods out of a pail of water, 
measuring them, putting them together, and flourish- 
ing them in the air with a shrill whistling sound. 
Grandmother, somewhere in the shadows, was taking 
snuff noisily and muttering: 

"Now you are in your element, tyrant!" 

Sascha Jaakov was sitting in a chair in the middle of 
the kitchen, rubbing his eyes with his knuckles, and 
whining like an old beggar in a voice quite unlike his 
usual voice: 

"Forgive me, for Christ's sake. . . . !" 

Standing by the chair, shoulder to shoulder, like 
wooden figures, stood the children of Uncle Michael, 
brother and sister. 

"When I have flogged you I will forgive you," said 
grandfather, drawing a long, damp rod across his 
knuckles. 

"Now then . . . take down your breeches!" 

He spoke very calmly, and neither the sound of his 
voice nor the noise made by the boy as he moved on 
the squeaky chair, nor the scraping of grandmother's 
feet, broke the memorable stillness of that almost dark 
kitchen, under the low, blackened ceiling. 



36 MY CHILDHOOD 

Sascha stood up, undid his trousers, letting them 
down as far as his knees, then bending and holding 
them up with his hands, he stumbled to the bench. It 
was painful to look at him, and my legs also began to 
tremble. 

But worse was to come, when he submissively lay 
down on the bench face downwards, and Vanka, tying 
him to it by means of a wide towel placed under his 
arms and round his neck, bent under him and with 
black hands seized his legs by the ankles. 

"Lexei!" called grandfather. "Come nearer! 
Come! Don't you hear me speaking to you? Look 
and see what a flogging is. . . . One !" 

With a mild flourish he brought the rod down on the 
naked flesh, and Sascha set up a howl. 

"Rubbish!" said grandfather. 'That's nothing! 
. . . But here 's something to make you smart." 

And he dealt such blows that the flesh was soon in 
a state of inflammation and covered with great red 
weals, and my cousin gave a prolonged howl. 

"Is n't it nice?" asked grandfather, as his hand rose 
and fell. "You don't like it? . . . That 's for the 
thimble!" 

When he raised his hand with a flourish my heart 
seemed to rise too, and when he let his hand tall some- 
thing within me seemed to sink. 

"I won't do it again," squealed Sascha, in a dread- 



MY CHILDHOOD 37 

fully thin, weak voice, unpleasant to hear. "Did n't 
I tell — didn't I tell about the tablecloth?' 

Grandfather answered calmly, as if he were reading 
the "Psalter" : 

"Tale-bearing is no justification. The informer 
gets whipped first, so take that for the tablecloth." 

Grandmother threw herself upon me and seized my 
hand, crying: "I won't allow Lexei to be touched! 
I won't allow it, you monster!" And she began to 
kick the door, calling: "Varia! Varvara!" 

Grandfather darted across to her, threw her down, 
seized me and carried me to the bench. I struck at 
him with my fists, pulled his sandy beard, and bit his 
fingers. He bellowed and held me as in a vice. In 
the end, throwing me down on the bench, he struck me 
on the face. 

I shall never forget his savage cry: "Tie him up! 
I 'm going to kill him !" nor my mother's white face and 
great eyes as she ran along up and down beside the 
bench, shrieking: 

"Father! You mustn't! Let me have him!" 



Grandfather flogged me till I lost consciousness, and 
I was unwell for some days, tossing about, face down- 
wards, on a wide, stuffy bed, in a little room with one 
window and a lamp which was always kept burning 



38 MY CHILDHOOD 

before the case of icons in the corner. Those dark 
days had been the greatest in my life. In the course 
of them I had developed wonderfully, and I was con- 
scious of a peculiar difference in myself. I began to 
experience a new solicitude for others, and I became so 
keenly alive to their sufferings and my own that it was 
almost as if my heart had been lacerated, and thus 
rendered sensitive. 

For this reason the quarrel between my mother and 
grandmother came as a great shock to me — when grand- 
mother, looking so dark and big in the narrow room, 
flew into a rage, and pushing my mother into the corner 
where the icons were, hissed : 

"Why did n't you take him away?" 

"I was afraid." 

"A strong, healthy creature like you! You ought 
to be ashamed of yourself, Varvara! I am an old 
woman and I am not afraid. For shame !" 

"Do leave off, Mother; I am sick of the whole busi- 



ness." 



"No, you don't love him! You have no pity for 
the poor orphan!" 

"I have been an orphan all my life," said my mother, 
speaking loudly and sadly. 

After that they both cried for a long time, seated 
on a box in a corner, and then my mother said : 



MY CHILDHOOD 39 

"If it were not for Alexei, I would leave this place 
— and go right away. I can't go on living in this hell, 
Mother, I can't! I haven't the strength." 

"Oh ! My own flesh and blood !" whispered grand- 
mother. 

I kept all this in my mind. Mother was weak, and, 
like the others, she was afraid of grandfather, and I 
was preventing her from leaving the house in which 
she found it impossible to live. It was very unfor- 
tunate. Before long my mother really did disappear 
from the house, going somewhere on a visit. 

Very soon after this, as suddenly as if he had fallen 
from the ceiling, grandfather appeared, and sitting on 
the bed, laid his ice-cold hands on my head. 

"How do you do, young gentleman'? Come! an- 
swer me. Don't sulk! Well"? What have you to 
say?' 

I had a great mind to kick away his legs, but it hurt 
me to move. His head, sandier than ever, shook from 
side to side uneasily ; his bright eyes seemed to be look- 
ing for something on the wall as he pulled out of his 
pocket a gingerbread goat, a horn made of sugar, an 
apple and a cluster of purple raisins, which he placed 
on the pillow under my very nose. 

"There you are ! There 's a present for you." 

And he stooped and kissed me on the forehead. 



4 o MY CHILDHOOD 

Then, stroking my head with those small, cruel hands, 
yellow-stained about the crooked, claw-like nails, he 
began to speak. 

"I left my mark on you then, my friend. You were 
very angry. You bit me and scratched me, and then 
I lost my temper too. However, it will do you no 
harm to have been punished more severely than you de- 
served. It will go towards next time. You must 
learn not to mind when people of your own family beat 
you. It is part of your training. It would be differ- 
ent if it came from an outsider, but from one of us it 
does not count. You must not allow outsiders to lay 
hands on you, but it is nothing coming from one of your 
own family. I suppose you think I was never flogged? 
Oleysha! I was flogged harder than you could ever 
imagine even in a bad dream. I was flogged so cruelly 
that God Himself might have shed tears to see it. 
And what was the result? I — an orphan, the son of a 
poor mother — have risen in my present position — the 
head of a guild, and a master workman." 

Bending his withered, well-knit body towards me, 
he began to tell me in vigorous and powerful language, 
with a felicitous choice of words, about the days of his 
childhood. His green eyes were very bright, and his 
golden hair stood rakishly on end as, deflecting his 
high-pitched voice, he breathed in my face. 

"You traveled here by steamboat . . . steam will 



MY CHILDHOOD 41 

take you anywhere now; but when I was young I had 
to tow a barge up the Volga all by myself. The barge 
was in the water and I ran barefoot on the bank, which 
was strewn with sharp stones. . . . Thus I went from 
early in the morning to sunset, with the sun beating 
fiercely on the back of my neck, and my head throbbing 
as if it were full of molten iron. And sometimes I 
was overcome by three kinds of ill-luck . . . my poor 
little bones ached, but I had to keep on, and I could 
not see the way; and then my eyes brimmed over, and 
I sobbed my heart out as the tears rolled down. Ah ! 
Oleysha ! it won't bear talking about. 

"I went on and on till the towing-rope slipped from 
me and I fell down on my face, and I was not sorry for 
it either! I rose up all the stronger. If I had not 
rested a minute I should have died. 

'That is the way we used to live then in the sight 
of God and of our Blessed Lord Jesus Christ. This is 
the way I took the measure of Mother Volga three 
times, from Simbirsk to Ribinsk, from there to Sara- 
tov, as far as Astrakhan and Markarev, to the Fair — 
more than three thousand versts. And by the fourth 
year I had become a free water-man. I had shown my 
master what I was made of." 

As he spoke he seemed to increase in size like a 
cloud before my very eyes, being transformed from a 
small, wizened old man to an individual of fabulous 



42 MY CHILDHOOD 

strength. Had he not pulled a great gray barge up the 
river all by himself? Now and again he jumped up 
from the bed and showed me how the barges traveled 
with the towing-rope round them, and how they 
pumped water, singing fragments of a song in a bass 
voice; then, youthfully springing back on the bed, to 
my ever-increasing astonishment, he would continue 
hoarsely and impressively. 

"Well, sometimes, Oleysha, on a summer's evening 
when we arrived at Jigulak, or some such place at the 
foot of the green hills, we used to sit about lazily cook- 
ing our supper while the boatmen of the hill-country 
used to sing sentimental songs, and as soon as they be- 
gan the whole crew would strike up, sending a thrill 
through one, and making the Volga seem as if it were 
running very fast like a horse, and rising up as high 
as the clouds; and all kinds of trouble seemed as noth- 
ing more than dust blown about by the wind. They 
sang till the porridge boiled over, for which the cook 
had to be nicked with a cloth. 'Play as much as you 
please, but don't forget your work,' we said." 

Several times people put their heads in at the door 
to call him, but each time I begged him not to go. 
And he laughingly waved them away, saying, "Wait 

a bit." 

He stayed with me and told me stories until it was 
almost dark, and when, after an affectionate farewell, 



MY CHILDHOOD 43 

he left me, I had learned that he was neither malevo- 
lent nor formidable. It brought the tears into my 
eyes to remember that it was he who had so cruelly 
beaten me, but I could not forget it. 

This visit of my grandfather opened the door to 
others, and from morning till night there was always 
somebody sitting on my bed, trying to amuse me; I 
remember that this was not always either cheering or 
pleasant. 

Oftener than any of them came my grandmother, 
who slept in the same bed with me. But it was Tsig- 
anok who left the clearest impression on me in those 
days. He used to appear in the evenings — square- 
built, broad-chested, curly headed, dressed in his best 
clothes — a gold-embroidered shirt, plush breeches, 
boots squeaking like a harmonium. His hair was 
glossy, his squinting, merry eyes gleamed under his 
thick eyebrows, and his white teeth under the shadow 
of his young mustache; his shirt glowed softly as if re- 
flecting the red light of the image-lamp. 

"Look here !" he said, turning up his sleeve and dis- 
playing his bare arm to the elbow. It was covered 
with red scars. "Look how swollen it is; and it was 
worse yesterday — it was very painful. When your 
grandfather flew into a rage and I saw that he was go- 
ing to flog you, I put my arm in the way, thinking 
that the rod would break, and then while he was look- 



44 MY CHILDHOOD 

ing for another your grandmother or your mother could 
take you away and hide you. I am an old bird at 
the game, my child." 

He laughed gently and kindly, and glancing again 
at the swollen arm, went on : 

"I was so sorry for you that I thought I should 
choke. It seemed such a shame! . . . But he lashed 
away at you!" 

Snorting and tossing his head like a horse, he went 
on speaking about the affair. This childish simplicity 
seemed to draw him closer to me. I told him that I 
loved him very much, and he answered with a sim- 
plicity which always lives in my memory. 

"And I love you too ! That is why I let myself be 
hurt — because I love you. Do you think I would have 
done it for any one else? I should be making a fool 
of myself." 

Later on he gave me whispered instructions, glancing 
frequently at the door. "Next time he beats you don't 
try to get away from him, and don't struggle. It 
hurts twice as much if you resist. If you let yourself 
go he will deal lightly with you. Be limp and soft, 
and don't scowl at him. Try and remember this; it is 
good advice." 

"Surely he won't whip me again!" I exclaimed. 

"Why, of course!" replied Tsiganok calmly. "Of 
course he will whip you again, and often too!" 



MY CHILDHOOD 45 

"But why?" 

"Because grandfather is on the watch for you." 
And again he cautiously advised me: "When he 
whips you he brings the rod straight down. Well, if 
you lie there quietly he may possibly hold the rod 
lower so that it won't break your skin. . . . Now, 
do you understand? Move your body towards him 
and the rod, and it will be all the better for you." 

Winking at me with his dark, squinting eyes, he 
added: "I know more about such matters than a 
policeman even. I have been beaten on my bare shoul- 
ders till the skin came off, my boy !" 

I looked at his bright face and remembered grand- 
mother's story of Ivan-Czarevitch and Ivanoshka-dour- 
achka. 



CHAPTER III 

WHEN I was well again I realized that Tsiganok 
occupied an important position in the house- 
hold. Grandfather did not storm at him as he did at 
his sons, and would say behind his back, half-closing 
his eyes and nodding his head : 

"He is a good workman — Tsiganok. Mark my 
words, he will get on; he will make his fortune." 

My uncles too were polite and friendly with Tsig- 
anok, and never played practical jokes on him as they 
did on the head workman, Gregory, who was the ob- 
ject of some insulting and spiteful trick almost every 
evening. Sometimes they made the handles of his 
scissors red-hot, or put a nail with the point upwards 
on the seat of his chair, or placed ready to his hand 
pieces of material all of the same color, so that when 
he, being half blind, had sewed them all into one piece, 
grandfather should scold him for it. 

One day when he had fallen asleep after dinner in 
the kitchen, they painted his face with fuchsin, and he 
had to go about for a long time a ludicrous and terrify- 
ing spectacle, with two round, smeared eyeglasses look- 

46 



MY CHILDHOOD 47 

ing out dully from his gray beard, and his long, livid 
nose drooping dejectedly, like a tongue. 

They had an inexhaustible fund of such pranks, but 
the head workman bore it all in silence, only quackling 
softly, and taking care before he touched either the 
iron, the scissors, the needlework or the thimble, to 
moisten his fingers copiously with saliva. This became 
a habit with him, and even at dinner-time before he 
took up his knife and fork he slobbered over his fin- 
gers, causing great amusement to the children. When 
he was hurt, his large face broke into waves of wrinkles, 
which curiously glided over his forehead, and, raising 
his eyebrows, vanished mysteriously on his bald 
cranium. 

I do not remember how grandfather bore himself 
with regard to his sons' amusements, but grandmother 
used to shake her fist at them, crying : 

"Shameless, ill-natured creatures!" 

But my uncles spoke evil of Tsiganok too behind his 
back; they made fun of him, found fault with his 
work, and called him a thief and an idler. 

I asked grandmother why they did this. She ex- 
plained it to me without hesitation, and, as always, 
made the matter quite clear to me. "You see, each 
wants to take Vaniushka with him when he sets up in 
business for himself; that is why they run him down 
to each other. Say they, 'He 's a bad workman' ; but 



48 MY CHILDHOOD 

they don't mean it. It is their artfulness. In addi- 
tion to this, they are afraid that Vaniushka will not go 
with either of them, but will stay with grandfather, 
who always gets his own way, and might set up a 
third workshop with Ivanka, which would do your 
uncles no good. Now do you understand ?" She 
laughed softly. "They are crafty about everything, 
setting God at naught; and grandfather, seeing their 
artfulness, teases them by saying: 'I shall buy Ivan 
a certificate of exemption so that they won't take him 
for a soldier. I can't do without him.' This makes 
them angry; it is just what they don't want; besides, 
they grudge the money. Exemptions cost money." 

I was living with grandmother again, as I had done 
on the steamer, and every evening before I fell asleep 
she used to tell me fairy stories, or tales about her life, 
which were just like a story. But she spoke about 
family affairs, such as the distribution of the property 
amongst the children, and grandfather's purchase of a 
new house, lightly, in the character of a stranger re- 
garding the matter from a distance, or at the most that 
of a neighbor, rather than that of the person next in 
importance to the head of the house. 

From her I learned that Tsiganok was a foundling; 
he had been found one wet night in early spring, on a 
bench in the porch. 

'There he lay," said grandmother pensively and 



MY CHILDHOOD 49 

mysteriously, "hardly able to cry, for he was nearly 
numb with cold." 

"But why do people abandon children*?" 

"It is because the mother has no milk, or anything 
to feed her baby with. Then she hears that a child 
which has been born somewhere lately is dead, and she 
goes and leaves her own there." 

She paused and scratched her head; then sighing 
and gazing at the ceiling, she continued : 

"Poverty is always the reason, Oleysha; and a kind 
of poverty which must not be talked about, for an un- 
married girl dare not admit that she has a child — peo- 
ple would cry shame upon her. 

"Grandfather wanted to hand Vaniushka over to 
the police, but I said 'No, we will keep him ourselves to 
fill the place of our dead ones.' For I have had eight- 
een children, you know. If they had all lived they 
would have filled a street — eighteen new families ! I 
was married at eighteen, you see, and by this time I had 
had fifteen children, but God so loved my flesh and 
blood that He took all of them — all my little babies to 
the angels, and I was sorry and glad at the same time." 

Sitting on the edge of the bed in her nightdress, 
huge and dishevelled, with her black hair falling about 
her, she looked like the bear which a bearded woodman 
from Cergatch had led into our yard not long ago. 

Making the sign of the cross on her spotless, snow- 



50 MY CHILDHOOD 

white breast, she laughed softly, always ready to make 
light of everything. 

"It was better for them to be taken, but hard for 
me to be left desolate, so I was delighted to have Ivanka 
— but even now I feel the pain of my love for you, my 
little ones! . . . Well, we kept him, and baptized 
him, and he still lives happily with us. At first I used 
to call him 'Beetle,' because he really did buzz some- 
times, and went creeping and buzzing through the 
rooms just like a beetle. You must love him. He is 
a good soul." 

I did love Ivan, and admired him inexpressibly. 
On Saturday when, after punishing the children for 
the transgressions of the week, grandfather went to 
vespers, we had an indescribably happy time in the 
kitchen. 

Tsiganok would get some cockroaches from the 
stove, make a harness of thread for them with great 
rapidity, cut out a paper sledge, and soon two pairs 
of black horses were prancing on the clean, smooth, 
yellow table. Ivan drove them at a canter, with a 
thin splinter of wood as a whip, and urged them on, 
shouting : 

"Now they have started for the Bishop's house." 

Then he gummed a small piece of paper to the back 
of one of the cockroaches and sent him to run behind 
the sledge. 



MY CHILDHOOD 51 

"We forgot the bag," he explained. "The monk 
drags it with him as he runs. Now then, gee- 
up!" 

He tied the feet of another cockroach together with 
cotton, and as the insect hopped along, with its head 
thrust forward, he cried, clapping his hands : 

"This is the deacon coming out of the wineshop 
to say vespers." 

After this he showed us a mouse which stood up at 
the word of command, and walked on his hind legs, 
dragging his long tail behind him and blinking comi- 
cally with his lively eyes, which were like black glass 
beads. 

He made friends of mice, and used to carry them 
about in his bosom, and feed them with sugar and 
kiss them. 

"Mice are clever creatures," he used to say in a tone 
of conviction. "The house-goblin is very fond of 
them, and whoever feeds them will have all his wishes 
granted by the old hob-goblin." 

He could do conjuring tricks with cards and coins 
too, and he used to shout louder than any of the chil- 
dren; in fact, there was hardly any difference between 
them and him. One day when they were playing cards 
with him they made him "booby" several times in suc- 
cession, and he was very much offended. He stuck 
his lips out sulkily and refused to play any more, and 



52 MY CHILDHOOD 

he complained to me afterward, his nose twitching as 
he spoke : 

"It was a put-up job! They were signaling to one 
another and passing the cards about under the table. 
Do you call that playing the game? If it comes to 
trickery I 'm not so bad at it myself." 

Yet he was nineteen years old and bigger than all 
four of us put together. 

I have special memories of him on holiday evenings, 
when grandfather and Uncle Michael went out to see 
their friends, and curly headed, untidy Uncle Jaakov 
appeared with his guitar while grandmother prepared 
tea with plenty of delicacies, and vodka in a square 
bottle with red flowers cleverly molded in glass on its 
lower part. Tsiganok shone bravely on these occa- 
sions in his holiday attire. Creeping softly and side- 
ways came Gregory, with his colored spectacles gleam- 
ing; came Nyanya Eugenia — pimply, red-faced and 
fat like a Toby-jug, with cunning eyes and a piping 
voice; came the hirsute deacon from Uspenski, and 
other dark slimy people bearing a resemblance to pikes 
and eels. They all ate and drank a lot, breathing hard 
the while; and the children had wineglasses of sweet 
syrup given them as a treat, and gradually there was 
kindled a warm but strange gaiety. 

Uncle Jaakov tuned his guitar amorously, and as he 
did so he always uttered the same words : 



MY CHILDHOOD 53 

"Well, now let us begin!" 

Shaking his curly head, he bent over the guitar, 
stretching out his neck like a goose; the expression on 
his round, careless face became dreamy, his passionate, 
elusive eyes were obscured in an unctuous mist, and 
L'ghtly touching the chords, he played something dis- 
jointed, involuntarily rising to his feet as he played. 
His music demanded an intense silence. It rushed like 
a rapid torrent from somewhere far away, stirring one's 
heart and penetrating it with an incomprehensible sen- 
sation of sadness and uneasiness. Under the influence 
of that music we all became melancholy, and the oldest 
present felt themselves to be no more than children. 
We sat perfectly still — lost in a dreamy silence. 
Sascha M^chailov especially listened with all his might 
as he sat upright beside our uncle, gazing at the guitar 
open-mouthod, and slobbering with delight. And the 
rest of us remained as if we had been frozen, or had 
been put under a spell. The only sound besides was 
the gentle murmur of the samovar which did not inter- 
fere with the complaint of the guitar. 

Two small square windows threw their light into 
the darkness of the autumn night, and from time to 
time some one tapped on them lightly. The yellow 
lights of two tallow candles, pointed like spears, flick- 
ered on the table. 

Uncle Jaakov grew more and more rigid, as though 



54 MY CHILDHOOD 

he were in a deep sleep with his teeth clenched; but 
his hands seemed to live with a separate existence. 
The bent fingers of his right hand quivered indistinctly 
over the dark keyboard, just like fluttering and strug- 
gling birds, while his left passed up and down the 
neck with elusive rapidity. 

When he had been drinking he nearly always s?ng 
through his teeth in an unpleasantly shrill voice, an end- 
less song: 

"If Jaakove were a dog 
He 'd howl from morn to night. 
Oie ! I am a-weary ! 
Oie! Life is dreary! 
In the streets the nuns walk, 
On the fence the ravens talk. 
Oie ! I am a-weary ! 
The cricket chirps behind the stove 
And sets the beetles on the move. 
Oie ! I am a-weary ! 
One beggar hangs his stockings up to dry, 
The other steals it away on the sly. 
Oie ! I am a-weary ! 
Yes! Life is very dreary!" 

I could not bear this song, and when my uncle came 
to the part about the beggars I used to weep in a 
tempest of ungovernable misery. 

The music had the same effect on Tsiganok as on 
the others; he listened to it, running his fingers through 



MY CHILDHOOD 55 

his black, shaggy locks, and staring into a corner, half- 
asleep. 

Sometimes he would exclaim unexpectedly in a com- 
plaining tone, "Ah! if I only had a voice. Lord! how 
I should sing." 

And grandmother, with a sigh, would say: "Are 
you going to break our hearts, Jaasha? . . . Suppose 
you give us a dance, Vanyatka 4 ?" 

Her request was not always complied with at once, 
but it did sometimes happen that the musician sud- 
denly swept the chords with his hands, then, doubling 
up his fists with a gesture as if he were noiselessly cast- 
ing an invisible something from him to the floor, cried 
sharply : 

"Away, melancholy! Now, Vanka, stand up!" 

Looking very smart, as he pulled his yellow blouse 
straight, Tsiganok would advance to the middle of the 
kitchen, very carefully, as if he were walking on nails, 
and blushing all over his swarthy face and simpering 
bashfully, would say entreatingly : 

"Faster, please, Jaakov Vassilitch !" 

The guitar jingled furiously, heels tapped spas- 
modically on the floor, plates and dishes rattled on the 
table and in the cupboard, while Tsiganok blazed 
amidst the kitchen lights, swooping like a kite, waving 
his arms like the sails of a windmill, and moving his 



56 MY CHILDHOOD 

feet so quickly that they seemed to be stationary ; then 
he stooped to the floor, and spun round and round like 
a golden swallow, the splendor of his silk blouse shed- 
ding an illumination all around, as it quivered and 
rippled, as if he were alight and floating in the air. 
He danced unweariedly, oblivious of everything, and 
it seemed as though, if the door were to open, he would 
have danced out, down the street, and through the town 
and away . . . beyond our ken. 

"Cross over!" cried Uncle Jaakov, stamping his 
feet, and giving a piercing whistle; then in an irritating 
voice he shouted the old, quaint saying: 

"Oh, my ! if I were not sorry to leave my spade 
I 'd from my wife and children a break have made." 

The people sitting at table pawed at each other, and 
from time to time shouted and yelled as if they were 
being roasted alive. The bearded chief workman 
slapped his bald head and joined in the uproar. Once 
he bent towards me, brushing my shoulder with his 
soft beard, and said in my ear, just as he might speak 
to a grown-up person : 

"If your father were here, Alexei Maximitch, he 
would have added to the fun. A merry fellow he 
was — always cheerful. You remember him, don't 
you'?" 

"No." 



MY CHILDHOOD 57 

"You don't? Well, once he and your grandmother 
— but wait a bit." 

Tall and emaciated, somewhat resembling a con- 
ventional icon, he stood up, and bowing to grand- 
mother, entreated in an extraordinarily gruff voice : 

"Akulina Ivanovna, will you be so kind as to dance 
for us as you did once with Maxim Savatyevitch? It 
would cheer us up." 

"What are you talking about, my dear man? 
What do you mean, Gregory Ivanovitch ?" cried 
grandmother, smiling and bridling. "Fancy me danc- 
ing at my time of life! I should only make people 
laugh." 

But suddenly she jumped up with a youthful air, 
arranged her skirts, and very upright, tossed her pon- 
derous head and darted across the kitchen, crying: 

"Well, laugh if you want to ! And a lot of good 
may it do you. Now, Jaasha, play up !" 

My uncle let himself go, and, closing his eyes, went 
on playing very slowly. Tsiganok stood still for a 
moment, and then leaped over to where grandmother 
was and encircled her, resting on his haunches, while 
she skimmed the floor without a sound, as if she were 
floating on air, her arms spread out, her eyebrows 
raised, her dark eyes gazing into space. She appeared 
very comical to me, and I made fun of her; but Gregory 
held up his finger sternly, and all the grown-up peo- 



58 MY CHILDHOOD 

pie looked disapprovingly over to my side of the 
room. 

"Don't make a noise, Ivan," said Gregory, and Tsig- 
anok obediently jumped to one side, and sat by the 
door, while Nyanya Eugenia, thrusting out her Adam's 
apple, began to sing in her low-pitched, pleasant voice : 

"All the week till Saturday 
She does earn what e'er she may, 
Making lace from morn till night 
Till she 's nearly lost her sight." 

Grandmother seemed more as if she were telling a 
story than dancing. She moved softly, dreamily; 
swaying slightly, sometimes looking about her from 
under her arms, the whole of her huge body wavering 
uncertainly, her feet feeling their way carefully. Then 
she stood still as if suddenly frightened by something; 
her face quivered and became overcast . . . but di- 
rectly after it was again illuminated by her pleasant, 
cordial smile. Swinging to one side as if to make way 
for some one, she appeared to be refusing to give her 
hand, then letting her head droop seemed to die ; again, 
she was listening to some one and smiling joyfully . . 
and suddenly she was whisked from her place and 
turned round and round like a whirligig, her figure 
seemed to become more elegant, she seemed to grow 
taller, and we could not tear our eyes away from her- 
so triumphantly beautiful and altogether charming did 



MY CHILDHOOD 59 

she appear in that moment of marvelous rejuvenation. 
And Nyanya Eugenia piped : 

"Then on Sundays after Mass 
Till midnight dances the lass, 
Leaving as late as she dare, 
Holidays with her are rare." 

When she had finished dancing, grandmother re- 
turned to her place by the samovar. They all ap- 
plauded her, and as she put her hair straight, she said : 

"That is enough ! You have never seen real danc- 
ing. At our home in Balakya, there was one young 
girl — I have forgotten her name now, with many 
others — but when you saw her dance you cried for joy. 
To look at her was a treat. You didn't want 
anything else. How I envied her — sinner that I 
was!" 

"Singers and dancers are the greatest people in the 
world," said Nyanya Eugenia gravely, and she began 
to sing something about King David, while Uncle 
Jaakov, embracing Tsiganok, said to him: 

"You ought to dance in the wineshops. You would 
turn people's heads." 

"I wish I could sing!" complained Tsiganok. "If 
God had given me a voice I should have been singing 
ten years by now, and should have gone on singing if 
only as a monk." 

They all drank vodka, and Gregory drank an extra 



60 MY CHILDHOOD 

lot. As she poured out glass after glass for him, grand- 
mother warned him : 

"Take care, Grisha, or you '11 become quite blind." 

"I don't care ! I 've no more use for my eyesight," 
he replied firmly. 

He drank, but he did not get tipsy, only becoming 
more loquacious every moment; and he spoke to me 
about my father nearly all the time. 

"A man with a large heart was my friend Maxim 
Savatyevitch . . ." 

Grandmother sighed as she corroborated : 

"Yes, indeed he was — a true child of God." 

All this was extremely interesting, and held me spell- 
bound, and filled my heart with a tender, not unpleas- 
ant sadness. For sadness and gladness live within us 
side by side, almost inseparable ; the one succeeding the 
other with an elusive, unappreciable swiftness. 

Once Uncle Jaakov, being rather tipsy, began to 
rend his shirt, and to clutch furiously at his curly hair, 
his grizzled mustache, his nose and his pendulous lip. 

"What am I?" he howled, dissolved in tears. 
"Why am I here?" And striking himself on the cheek, 
forehead and chest, he sobbed: "Worthless, de- 
graded creature ! Lost soul !" 

"A — ah ! You 're right !" growled Gregory. 

But grandmother, who was also not quite sober, said 
to her son, catching hold of his hand : 



MY CHILDHOOD 61 

"That will do, Jaasha. God knows how to teach 



us." 



When she had been drinking, she was even more 
attractive; her eyes grew darker and smiled, shedding 
the warmth of her heart upon every one. Brushing 
aside the handkerchief which made her face too hot, 
she would say in a tipsy voice: 

"Lord! Lord! How good everything is! Don't 
you see how good everything is?" 

And this was a cry from her heart — the watchword 
of her whole life. 

I was much impressed by the tears and cries of my 
happy-go-lucky uncle, and I asked grandmother why 
he cried and scolded and beat himself so. 

"You want to know everything!" she said reluc- 
tantly, quite unlike her usual manner. "But wait a 
bit. You will be enlightened about this affair quite 
soon enough." 

My curiosity was still more excited by this, and I 
went to the workshop and attacked Ivan on the sub- 
ject, but he would not answer me. He just laughed 
quietly with a sidelong glance at Gregory, and hustled 
me out, crying: 

"Give over now, and run away. If you don't I '11 
put you in the vat and dye you." 

Gregory, standing before the broad, low stove, with 
vats cemented to it, stirred them with a long black 



62 MY CHILDHOOD 

poker, lifting it up now and again to see the colored 
drops fall from its end. The brightly burning flames 
played on the skin-apron, multi-colored like the chas- 
uble of a priest, which he wore. The dye simmered 
in the vats; an acrid vapor extended in a thick cloud 
to the door. Gregory glanced at me from under his 
glasses, with his clouded, bloodshot eyes, and said 
abruptly to Ivan: 

"You are wanted in the yard. Can't you see*?" 

But when Tsiganok had gone into the yard, Gregory, 
sitting on a sack of santaline, beckoned me to him. 

"Come here!" 

Drawing me on to his knee, and rubbing his warm, 
soft beard against my cheek, he said in a tone of rem- 
iniscence : 

"Your uncle beat and tortured his wife to death, 
and now his conscience pricks him. Do you under- 
stand? You want to understand everything, you see, 
and so you get muddled." 

Gregory was as simple as grandmother, but his 
words were disconcerting, and he seemed to look 
through and through every one. 

"How did he kill her?" he went on in a leisurely 
tone. "Why, like this. He was lying in bed with 
her, and he threw the counterpane over her head, and 
held it down while he beat her. Why? He doesn't 
know himself why he did it." 



MY CHILDHOOD 63 

And paying no attention to Ivan, who, having re- 
turned with an armful of goods from the yard, was 
squatting before the fire, warming his hands, the head 
workman suggested: 

"Perhaps it was because she was better than he was, 
and he was envious of her. The Kashmirins do not 
like good people, my boy. They are jealous of them. 
They cannot stand them, and try to get them out of 
the way. Ask your grandmother how they got rid of 
your father. She will tell you everything; she hates 
deceit, because she does not understand it. She may 
be reckoned among the saints, although she drinks 
wine and takes snuff. She is a splendid woman. 
Keep hold of her, and never let her go." 

He pushed me towards the door, and I went out into 
the yard, depressed and scared. Vaniushka overtook 
me at the entrance of the house, and whispered 
softly : 

"Don't be afraid of him. He is all right. Look 
him straight in the eyes. That 's what he likes." 

It was all very strange and distressing. I hardly 
knew any other existence, but I remembered vaguely 
that my father and mother used not to live like this; 
they had a different way of speaking, and a different 
idea of happiness. They always went about together 
and sat close to each other. They laughed very fre- 
quently and for a long time together, in the evenings, 



64 MY CHILDHOOD 

as they sat at the window and sang at the top of their 
voices; and people gathered together in the street and 
looked at them. The raised faces of these people as 
they looked up reminded me comically of dirty plates 
after dinner. But here people seldom laughed, and 
when they did it was not always easy to guess what 
they were laughing at. They often raged at one 
another, and secretly muttered threats against each 
other in the corners. The children were subdued and 
neglected; beaten down to earth like the dust by the 
rain. I felt myself a stranger in the house, and all 
the circumstances of my existence in it were nothing 
but a series of stabs, pricking me on to suspicion, and 
compelling me to study what went on with the closest 
attention. 

My friendship with Tsiganok grew apace. Grand- 
mother was occupied with household duties from sun- 
rise till late at night, and I hung round Tsiganok 
nearly the whole day. He still used to put his hand 
under the rod whenever grandfather thrashed me, and 
the next day, displaying his swollen fingers, he would 
complain : 

"There 's no sense in it ! It does not make it any 
lighter for you, and look what it does to me. I won't 
stand it any longer, so there !" 

But the next time he put himself in the way of 
being needlessly hurt just the same. 



MY CHILDHOOD 65 

"But I thought you did not mean to do it again ?" 
I would say. 

"I didn't mean to, but it happened somehow. I 
did it without thinking." 

Soon after this I learned something about Tsiganok 
which increased my interest in and love for him. 

Every Friday he used to harness the bay gelding 
Sharapa, grandmother's pet — a cunning, saucy, dainty 
creature — to the sledge. Then he put on his fur coat, 
which reached to his knees, and his heavy cap, and 
tightly buckling his green belt, set out for the market 
to buy provisions. Sometimes it was very late before 
he returned, and the whole household became uneasy. 
Some one would run to the window every moment, and 
breathing on the panes to thaw the ice, would look up 
and down the road. 

"Isn't he in sight yet?" 

"No." 

Grandmother was always more concerned than any 
of them. 

"Alas !" she would exclaim to her sons and my grand- 
father, "you have ruined both the man and the horse. 
I wonder you are n't ashamed of yourselves, you con- 
scienceless creatures! Ach! You family of fools, 
you tipplers ! God will punish you for this." 

"That is enough!" growled grandfather, scowling. 
"This is the last time it happens." 



66 MY CHILDHOOD 

Sometimes Tsiganok did not return till midday. 
My uncles and grandfather hurried out to the yard to 
meet him, and grandmother ambled after them like a 
bear, taking snuff with a determined air, because it was 
her hour for taking it. The children ran out, and the 
joyful unloading of the sledge began. It was full of 
pork, dead birds, and joints of all kinds of meat. 

"Have you bought all we told you to?" asked 
grandfather, probing the load with a sidelong glance 
of his sharp eyes. 

"Yes, it is all right," answered Ivan gaily, as he 
jumped about the yard, and slapped his mittened hands 
together, to warm himself. 

"Don't wear your mittens out. They cost money," 
said grandfather sternly. "Have you any change?" 

"No." 

Grandfather walked quietly round the load and said 
in a low tone : 

"Again you have bought too much. However, you 
can't do it without money, can you? I '11 have no 
more of this." And he strode away scowling. 

My uncles joyfully set to work on the load, whistling 
as they balanced bird, fish, goose-giblets, calves' feet, 
and enormous pieces of meat on their hands. 

"Well, that was soon unloaded!" they cried with 
loud approval. 

Uncle Michael especially was in raptures, jumping 



MY CHILDHOOD 67 

about the load, sniffing hard at the poultry, smacking 
his lips with relish, closing his restless eyes in ecstasy. 
He resembled his father; he had the same dried-up 
appearance, only he was taller and his hair was 
dark. 

Slipping his chilled hands up his sleeves, he in- 
quired of Tsiganok : 

"How much did my father give you?" 

"Five roubles." 

"There is fifteen roubles' worth here! How much 
did you spend?" 

"Four roubles, ten kopecks." 

"Perhaps the other ninety kopecks is in your pocket. 
Have n't you noticed, Jaakov, how money gets all over 
the place?" 

Uncle Jaakov, standing in the frost in his shirt- 
sleeves, laughed quietly, blinking in the cold blue light. 

"You have some brandy for us, Vanka, have n't 
you?" he asked lazily. 

Grandmother meanwhile was unharnessing the horse. 

"There, my little one! There! Spoiled child! 
There, God's plaything !" 

Great Sharapa, tossing his thick mane, fastened his 
white teeth in her shoulder, pushed his silky nose into 
her hair, gazed into her face with contented eyes, and 
shaking the frost from his eyelashes, softly neighed. 

"Ah ! you want some bread." 



68 MY CHILDHOOD 

She thrust a large, salted crust in his mouth, and 
making her apron into a bag under his nose, she 
thoughtfully watched him eat. 

Tsiganok, himself as playful as a young horse, 
sprang to her side. 

"He is such a good horse, Grandma! And so 
clever!" 

"Get away! Don't try your tricks on me!" cried 
grandmother, stamping her foot. "You know that I 
am not fond of you to-day." 

She afterwards explained to me that Tsiganok had 
not bought so much in the market as he had stolen. 
"If grandfather gives him five roubles, he spends 
three and steals three roubles' worth," she said sadly. 
"He takes a pleasure in stealing. He is like a spoiled 
child. He tried it once, and it turned out well; he 
was laughed at and praised for his success, and that 
is how he got into the habit of thieving. And grand- 
father, who in his youth ate the bread of poverty till 
he wanted no more of it, has grown greedy in his old 
age, and money is dearer to him now than the blood 
of his own children! He is glad even of a present! 
As for Michael and Jaakov . . ." 

She made a gesture of contempt and was silent a 
moment; then looking fixedly at the closed lid of her 
snuff-box, she went on querulously: 

"But there, Lenya, that 's a bit of work done by a 



MY CHILDHOOD 69 

blind woman . . . Dame Fortune . . . there she sits 
spinning for us and we can't even choose the pattern. 
. . . But there it is! If they caught Ivan thieving 
they would beat him to death." 

And after another silence she continued quietly: 

"Ah ! we have plenty of principles, but we don't put 
them into practice." 

The next day I begged Vanka not to steal any more. 
"If you do they '11 beat you to death." 

"They won't touch me ... I should soon wriggle 
out of their clutches. I am as lively as a mettlesome 
horse," he said, laughing; but the next minute his 
face fell. "Of course I know quite well that it is 
wrong and risky to steal. I do it . . . just to amuse 
myself, because I am bored. And I don't save any 
of the money. Your uncles get it all out of me be- 
fore the week is over. But I don't care! Let them 
take it. I have more than enough." 

Suddenly he took me up in his arms, shaking me 
gently. 

"You will be a strong man, you are so light and 
slim, and your bones are so firm. I say, why don't 
you learn to play on the guitar? Ask Uncle Jaakov! 
But you are too small yet, that 's a pity ! You 're 
little, but you have a temper of your own ! You don't 
like your grandfather much, do you?" 

"I don't know." 



70 MY CHILDHOOD 

"I don't like any of the Kashmirins except your 
grandmother. Let the devil like them !" 

"What about me?' 

"You 4 ? You are not a Kashmirin. You are a 
Pyeshkov. . . . That 's different blood — a different 
stock altogether." 

Suddenly he gave me a violent squeeze. 

"Ah!" he almost groaned. "If only I had a good 
voice for singing! Good Lord! what a stir I should 
make in the world! . . . Run away now, old chap. 
I must get on with my work." 

He set me down on the floor, put a handful of fine 
nails into his mouth, and began to stretch and nail 
damp breadths of black material on a large square 
board. 

His end came very soon after this. 

It happened thus. Leaning up against a partition 
by the gate in the yard was placed a large oaken cross 
with stout, knotty arms. It had been there a long 
time. I had noticed it in the early days of my life 
in the house, when it had been new and yellow, but 
now it was blackened by the autumn rains. It gave 
forth the bitter odor of barked oak, and it was in the 
way in the crowded, dirty yard. 

Uncle Jaakov had bought it to place over the grave 
of his wife, and had made a vow to carry it on his 
shoulders to the cemetery on the anniversary of her 



MY CHILDHOOD 71 

death, which fell on a Saturday at the beginning of 
winter. 

It was frosty and windy and there had been a fall 
of snow. Grandfather and grandmother, with the 
three grandchildren, had gone early to the cemetery 
to hear the requiem ; I was left at home as a punish- 
ment for some fault. 

My uncles, dressed alike in short black fur coats, 
lifted the cross from the ground and stood under its 
arms. Gregory and some men not belonging to the 
yard raised the heavy beams with difficulty, and placed 
the cross on the broad shoulders of Tsiganok. He tot- 
tered, and his legs seemed to give way. 

"Are you strong enough to carry it?" asked Greg- 
ory. 

"I don't know. It seems heavy." 

"Open the gate, you blind devil!" cried Uncle 
Michael angrily. 

And Uncle Jaakov said: 

"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Vanka. 
You are stronger than the two of us together." 

But Gregory, throwing open the gate, persisted in 
advising Ivan: 

"Take care you don't break down! Go, and may 
God be with you !" 

"Bald-headed fool !" cried Uncle Michael, from the 
street. 



72 MY CHILDHOOD 

All the people in the yard, meanwhile, laughed and 
talked loudly, as if they were glad to get rid of the 
cross. 

Gregory Ivanovitch took my hand and led me to 
the workshop, saying kindly: 

"Perhaps, under the circumstances, grandfather 
won't thrash you to-day." 

He sat me on a pile of woolens ready for dyeing, 
carefully wrapping them round me as high as my 
shoulders; and inhaling the vapor which rose from the 
vats, he said thoughtfully: 

"I have known your grandfather for thirty-seven 
years, my dear. I saw his business at its commence- 
ment, and I shall see the end of it. We were friends 
then — in fact, we started and planned out the business 
together. He is a clever man, is your grandfather! 
He meant to be master, but I did not know it. How- 
ever, God is more clever than any of us. He has only 
to smile and the wisest man will blink like a fool. You 
don't understand yet all that is said and done, but you 
must learn to understand everything. An orphan's 
life is a hard one. Your father, Maxim Savatyevitch, 
was a trump. He was well-educated too. That is 
why your grandfather did not like him, and would have 
nothing to do with him." 

It was pleasant to listen to these kind words and to 
watch the red and gold flames playing in the stove, 



MY CHILDHOOD 73 

and the milky cloud of steam which rose from the 
vats and settled like a dark blue rime on the slanting 
boards of the roof, through the uneven chinks of which 
the sky could be seen, like strands of blue ribbon. The 
wind had fallen; the yard looked as if it were strewn 
with glassy dust; the sledges gave forth a sharp sound 
as they passed up the street; a blue smoke rose from 
the chimneys of the house; faint shadows glided over 
the snow . . . also telling a story. 

Lean, long-limbed Gregory, bearded and hatless, 
large-eared, just like a good-natured wizard, stirred 
the boiling dye, instructing me the while. 

"Look every one straight in the eyes. And if a dog 
should fly at you, do the same; he will let you alone 
then." 

His heavy spectacles pressed on the bridge of his 
nose, the tip of which was blue like grandmother's — 
and for the same reason. 

"What is that 4 ?" he exclaimed suddenly, listening; 
then closing the door of the stove with his foot, he 
ran, or rather hopped, across the yard, and I dashed 
after him. In the middle of the kitchen floor lay 
Tsiganok, face upwards; broad streaks of light from 
the window fell on his head, his chest, and on his 
feet. His forehead shone strangely; his eyebrows 
were raised; his squinting eyes gazed intently at the 
blackened ceiling; a red-flecked foam bubbled from 



74 MY CHILDHOOD 

his discolored lips, from the comers of which also 
flowed blood over his cheeks, his neck, and on to the 
floor; and a thick stream of blood crept from under 
his back. His legs were spread out awkwardly, and 
it was plain that his trousers were wet; they clung 
damply to the boards, which had been polished with 
sand, and shone like the sun. The rivulets of blood 
intersected the streams of light, and, showing up very 
vividly, flowed towards the threshold. 

Tsiganok was motionless, except for the fact that 
as he lay with his hands alongside his body, his fin- 
gers scratched at the floor, and his stained fingernails 
shone in the sunlight. 

Nyanya Eugenia, crouching beside him, put a 
slender candle into his hand, but he could not hold it 
and it fell to the floor, the wick being drenched in 
blood. Nyanya Eugenia picked it up and wiped it 
dry, and made another attempt to fix it in those rest- 
less fingers. A gentle whispering made itself heard in 
the kitchen; it seemed to blow me away from the 
door like the wind, but I held firmly to the door- 
post. 

"He stumbled!" Uncle Jaakov was explaining, in 
a colorless voice, shuddering and turning his head 
about. His face was gray and haggard; his eyes had 
lost their color, and blinked incessantly. "He fell, 
and it fell on top of him . . . and hit him on the 



MY CHILDHOOD 75 

back. We should have been disabled if we had not 
dropped the cross in time." 

"This is your doing," said Gregory dully. 

"But how . . . V 

"Tou did it!" 

All this time the blood was flowing, and by the 
door had already formed a pool which seemed to grow 
darker and deeper. With another effusion of blood- 
flecked foam, Tsiganok roared out as if he were 
dreaming, and then collapsed, seeming to grow flatter 
and flatter, as if he were glued to the floor, or sinking 
through it. 

"Michael went on horseback to the church to find 
father," whispered Uncle Jaakov, "and I brought 
him here in a cab as quickly as I could. It is a good 
job that I was not standing under the arms myself, or 
I should have been like this." 

Nyanya Eugenia again fixed the candle in 
Tsiganok' s hand, dropping wax and tears in his palm. 

"That 's right ! Glue his head to the floor, you 
careless creature," said Gregory gruffly and rudely. 

"What do you mean?" 

"Why don't you take off his cap?" 

Nyanya dragged Ivan's cap from his head, which 
struck dully on the floor. Then it fell to one side and 
the blood flowed profusely from one side of his mouth 
only. This went on for a terribly long time. At first 



76 MY CHILDHOOD 

I expected Tsiganok to sit up on the floor with a sigh, 
and say sleepily, "Phew! It is baking hot!" as he 
used to do after dinner on Sundays. 

But he did not rise ; on the contrary he seemed to be 
sinking into the ground. The sun had withdrawn from 
him now; its bright beams had grown shorter, and 
fell only on the window-sill. His whole form grew 
darker ; his fingers no longer moved ; the froth had dis- 
appeared from his lips. Round his head three can- 
dles stood out from the darkness, waving their golden 
flames, lighting up his dishevelled blue-black hair, and 
throwing quivering yellow ripples on his swarthy 
cheek, illuminating the tip of his pointed nose and his 
blood-stained teeth. 

Nyanya, kneeling at his side, shed tears as she 
lisped: "My little dove! My bird of consolation!" 

It was painfully cold. I crept under the table and 
hid myself there. Then grandfather came tumbling 
into the kitchen, in his coat of racoon fur; with him 
came grandmother in a cloak with a fur collar, Uncle 
Michael, the children, and many people not belong- 
ing to the house. 

Throwing his coat on the floor, grandfather cried: 

"Riff-raff! See what you have done for me, be- 
tween you, in your carelessness ! He would have been 
worth his weight in gold in five years — that 's cer- 



tain!" 



MY CHILDHOOD 77 

The coats which had been thrown on the floor hin- 
dered me from seeing Ivan, so I crept out and knocked 
myself against grandfather's legs. He hurled me to 
one side, as he shook his little red fist threateningly at 
my uncles. 

"You wolves!" 

He sat down on a bench, and resting his arms upon 
it, burst into dry sobs, and said in a shrill voice : 

"I know all about it! . . . He stuck in your giz- 
zards! That was it! Oh, Vaniushka, poor fool! 
What have they done to you, eh? 'Rotten reins are 
good enough for a stranger's horse!' Mother! God 
has not loved us for the last year, has He*? Mother!" 

Grandmother, doubled up on the floor, was feeling 
Ivan's hands and chest, breathing upon his eyes, hold- 
ing his hands and chafing them. Then, throwing down 
all the candles, she rose with difficulty to her feet, 
looking very somber in her shiny black frock, and with 
her eyes dreadfully wide open, she said in a low voice : 
"Go, accursed ones !" 

All, with the exception of grandfather, straggled 
out of the kitchen. 

Tsiganok was buried without fuss, and was soon 
forgotten. 



CHAPTER IV 

I WAS lying in a wide bed, with a thick blanket 
folded four times around me, listening to grand- 
mother, who was saying her prayers. She was on her 
knees; and pressing one hand against her breast, she 
reverently crossed herself from time to time with the 
other. Out in the yard a hard frost reigned ; a greenish 
moonlight peeped through the ice patterns on the win- 
dow-panes, falling flatteringly on her kindly face and 
large nose, and kindling a phosphorescent light in her 
dark eyes. Her silky, luxuriant tresses were lit up as 
if by a furnace; her dark dress rustled, falling in rip- 
ples from her shoulders and spreading about her on the 
floor. 

When she had finished her prayers grandmother un- 
dressed in silence, carefully folding up her clothes and 
placing them on the trunk in the corner. Then she 
came to bed. I pretended to be fast asleep. 

"You are not asleep, you rogue, you are only mak- 
ing believe," she said softly. "Come, my duck, let 's 
have some bedclothes !" 

Foreseeing what would happen, I could not repress 
a smile, upon seeing which she cried: "So this is how 

78 



MY CHILDHOOD 79 

you trick your old grandmother'?" And taking hold 
of the blanket she drew it towards her with so much 
force and skill that I bounced up in the air, and turn- 
ing over and over fell back with a squash into the soft 
feather bed, while she said with a chuckle : "What is 
it, little Hop o' my Thumb? Have you been bitten 
by a mosquito?" 

But sometimes she prayed for such a long time that 
I really did fall asleep, and did not hear her come 
to bed. 

The longer prayers were generally the conclusion 
of a day of trouble, or a day of quarreling and fight- 
ing; and it was very interesting to listen to them. 
Grandmother gave to God a circumstantial account 
of all that had happened in the house. Bowed down, 
looking like a great mound, she knelt, at first whisper- 
ing rapidly and indistinctly, then hoarsely muttering: 

"O Lord, Thou knowest that all of us wish to do 
better. Michael, the elder, ought to have been set up 
in the town — it will do him harm to be on the river; 
and the other is a new neighborhood and not overdone. 
I don't know what will come of it all ! There 's 
father now. Jaakov is his favorite. Can't it be right 
to love one child more than the others'? He is an ob- 
stinate old man; do Thou, O Lord, teach him!" 

Gazing at the dark-featured icon, with her large, 
brilliant eyes, she thus counseled God : 



80 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Send him a good dream, O Lord, to make him un- 
derstand how he ought to treat his children !" 

After prostrating herself and striking her broad fore- 
head on the floor, she again straightened herself, and 
said coaxingly: 

"And send Varvara some happiness ! How has she 
displeased Thee? Is she more sinful than the others? 
Why should a healthy young woman be so afflicted? 
And remember Gregory, O Lord! His eyes are get- 
ting worse and worse. If he goes blind he will be sent 
adrift. That will be terrible! He has used up all 
his strength for grandfather, but do you think it likely 
that grandfather will help him? O Lord! Lord!" 

She remained silent for a long time, with her head 
bowed meekly, and her hands hanging by her sides, 
as still as if she had fallen asleep, or had been sud- 
denly frozen. 

"What else is there?" she asked herself aloud, 
wrinkling her brows. 

"O Lord, save all the faithful! Pardon me — ac- 
cursed fool as I am ! — Thou knowest that I do not sin 
out of malice but out of stupidity." And drawing a 
deep breath she would say lovingly and contentedly: 
"Son of God, Thou knowest all! Father, Thou 
seest all things." 

I was very fond of grandmother's God Who seemed 
so near to her, and I often said: 



MY CHILDHOOD 81 

"Tell me something about God." 

She used to speak about Him in a peculiar manner 
— very quietly, strangely drawing out her words, 
closing her eyes; and she made a point of always sit- 
ting down and arranging her head-handkerchief very 
deliberately before she began. 

"God's seat is on the hills, amidst the meadows of 
Paradise ; it is an altar of sapphires under silver linden 
trees which flower all the year round, for in Paradise 
there is no winter, nor even autumn, and the flowers 
never wither, for joy is the divine favor. And round 
about God many angels fly like flakes of snow; and 
it may be even that bees hum there, and white doves 
fly between Heaven and earth, telling God all about 
us and everybody. And here on earth you and I and 
grandfather each has been given an angel. God treats 
us all equally. For instance, your angel will go and 
tell God: 'Lexei put his tongue out at grandfather.' 
And God says : £ A11 right, let the old man whip him.' 
And so it is with all of us ; God gives to all what they 
deserve — to some grief, to others joy. And so all is 
right that He does, and the angels rejoice, and spread 
their wings and sing to Him without ceasing: 'Glory 
be unto Thee, O God ; Glory be unto Thee.' And He 
just smiles on them, and it is enough for them — and 
more." And she would smile herself, shaking her head 
from side to side. 



82 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Have you seen that?" 

"No, I have not seen it, but I know." 

When she spoke about God, or Heaven, or the 
angels, she seemed to shrink in size; her face grew 
younger, and her liquid eyes emitted a curious warm 
radiance. I used to take her heavy, satiny plait in my 
hands, and wind it round my neck as I sat quite still 
and listened to the endless but never tedious story. 

"It is not given to men to see God — their sight is 
dim! Only the saints may look upon Him face to 
face. But I have seen angels myself; they reveal 
themselves sometimes to souls in a state of grace. I 
was standing in church at an early Mass, and I saw 
two moving about the altar like clouds. One could 
see everything, through them, growing brighter and 
brighter, and their gossamer-like wings touched the 
floor. They moved about the altar, helping old Father 
Elia, and supporting his elbows as he raised his feeble 
hands in prayer. He was very old, and being almost 
blind, stumbled frequently; but that day he got through 
the Mass quickly, and was finished early. When I 
saw them I nearly died of joy. My heart seemed as 
if it would burst; my tears ran down. Ah, how beauti- 
ful it was! Oh, Lenka, dear heart, where God is — 
whether in Heaven or earth — all goes well." 

"But you don't mean to say that everything goes 
well here — in our house?" 



MY CHILDHOOD 83 

Making the sign of the cross grandmother answered : 

"Our Lady be praised — everything goes well." 

This irritated me. I could not agree that things 
were going well in our household. From my point 
of view they were becoming more and more intoler- 
able. 

One day, as I passed the door of Uncle Michael's 
room I saw Aunt Natalia, not fully dressed, with her 
hands folded on her breast, pacing up and down like 
a creature distraught, and moaning, not loudly, but 
in a tone of agony : 

"My God, take me under Thy protection ! Remove 
me from here !" 

I could sympathize with her prayer as well as I could 
understand Gregory when he growled: 

"As soon as I am quite blind they will turn me out 
to beg; it will be better than this, anyhow." 

And I wished that he would make haste and go blind, 
for I meant to seize the opportunity to go away with 
him so that we could start begging together. I had al- 
ready mentioned the matter to Gregory, and he had re- 
plied, smiling in his beard : 

"That 's right ! We will go together. But I shall 
show myself in the town. There 's a grandson of 
Vassili Kashmirin's there — his daughter's son; he may 
give me something to do." 

More than once I noticed a blue swelling under the 



84 MY CHILDHOOD 

sunken eyes of Aunt Natalia; and sometimes a swollen 
lip was thrown into relief by her yellow face. 

"Does Uncle Michael beat her, then?" I asked 
grandmother. And she answered with a sigh : 

"Yes, he beats her, but not very hard — the devil! 
Grandfather does not object so long as he does it at 
night. He is ill-natured, and she — she is like a 
jelly! 

"But he does not beat her as much as he used to," 
she continued in a more cheerful tone. "He just gives 
her a blow on the mouth, or boxes her ears, or drags her 
about by the hair for a minute or so; but at one time 
he used to torture her for hours together. Grandfather 
beat me one Easter Day from dinner-time till bed-time. 
He kept on; he just stopped to get his breath some- 
times, and then started again. And he used a strap 
too!" 

"But why did he do it?" 

"I forget now. Another time he knocked me about 
till I was nearly dead, and then kept me without food 
for five hours. I was hardly alive when he had finished 
with me." 

I was thunderstruck. Grandmother was twice as big 
as grandfather, and it was incredible that he should be 
able to get the better of her like this. 

"Is he stronger than you, then?" I asked. 

"Not stronger, but older. Besides, he is my hus- 



MY CHILDHOOD 85 

band, he has to answer for me to God ; but my duty is 
to suffer patiently." 

It was an interesting and pleasing sight to see her 
dusting the icon and cleaning its ornamentation; it was 
richly adorned with pearls, silver and colored gems in 
the crown, and as she took it gently in her hands she 
gazed at it with a smile, and said in a tone of feeling : 

"See what a sweet face it is !" And crossing herself 
and kissing it, she went on : "Dusty art thou, and be- 
grimed, Mother, Help of Christians, Joy of the Elect ! 
Look, Lenia, darling, how small the writing is, and 
what tiny characters they are ; and yet it is all quite dis- 
tinct. It is called The Twelve Holy-Days,' and in 
the middle you see the great Mother of God by pre- 
destination immaculate ; and here is written : 'Mourn 
not for me, Mother, because I am about to be laid in the 
grave.' " 

Sometimes it seemed to me as if she played with the 
icon as earnestly and seriously as my Cousin Ekaterina 
with her doll. 

She often saw devils, sometimes several together, 
sometimes one alone. 

"One clear moonlight night, during the great Fast, 
I was passing the Rudolphovs' house, and looking up I 
saw, on the roof, a devil sitting close to the chimney! 
He was all black, and he was holding his horned head 
over the top of the chimney and sniffing vigorously. 



86 MY CHILDHOOD 

There he sat sniffing and grunting, the great, unwieldy 
creature, with his tail on the roof, scraping with his 
feet all the time. I made the sign of the Cross at him 
and said : 'Christ is risen from the dead, and His ene- 
mies are scattered.' At that he gave a low howl and 
slipped head over heels from the roof to the yard — so 
he was scattered ! They must have been cooking meat 
at the Rudolphovs' that day, and he was enjoying the 
smell of it." 

I laughed at her picture of the devil flying head 
over heels off the roof, and she laughed too as she 
said: 

"They are as fond of playing tricks as children. 
One day I was doing the washing in the washhouse and 
it was getting late, when suddenly the door of the lit- 
tle room burst open and in rushed lots of little red, 
green and black creatures like cockroaches, and all 
sizes, and spread themselves all over the place. I flew 
towards the door, but I could not get past ; there I was 
unable to move hand or foot amongst a crowd of devils ! 
They filled the whole place so that I could not turn 
round. They crept about my feet, plucked at my dress, 
and crowded round me so that I had not even room to 
cross myself. Shaggy, and soft, and warm, somewhat 
resembling cats, though they walked on their hind legs, 
they went round and round me, peering into everything, 
showing their teeth like mice, blinking their small green 



MY CHILDHOOD 87 

eyes, almost piercing me with their horns, and sticking 
out their little tails — they were like pigs' tails. Oh, 
my dear ! I seemed to be going out of my mind. And 
didn't they push me about too! The candle nearly 
went out, the water in the copper became luke-warm, 
the washing was all thrown about the floor. Ah! 
your very breath was trouble and sorrow." 

Closing my eyes, I could visualize the threshold of 
the little chamber with its gray cobble-stones, and the 
unclean stream of shaggy creatures of diverse colors 
which gradually filled the washhouse. I could see 
them blowing out the candle and thrusting out their 
impudent pink tongues. It was a picture both comical 
and terrifying. 

Grandmother was silent a minute, shaking her head, 
before she burst out again : 

"And I saw some fiends too, one wintry night, when 
it was snowing. I was coming across the Dinkov 
Causeway — the place where, if you remember, your 
Uncle Michael and your Uncle Jaakov tried to drown 
your father in an ice-hole — and I was just going to take 
the lower path, when there came the sounds of hissing 
and hooting, and I looked up and saw a team of three 
raven-black horses tearing towards me. On the coach- 
man's place stood a great fat devil, in a red nightcap, 
with protruding teeth. He was holding the reins, made 
of forged iron chains, with outstretched arms, and as 



88 MY CHILDHOOD 

there was no way round, the horses flew right over the 
pond, and were hidden by a cloud of snow. All those 
sitting in the sledge behind were devils too; there they 
sat, hissing and screaming and waving their nightcaps. 
In all, seven troikas like this tore by, as if they had 
been fire-engines, all with black horses, and all carrying 
a load of thoroughbred devils. They pay visits to each 
other, you know, and drive about in the night to their 
different festivities. I expect that was a devil's wed- 
ding that I saw." 

One had to believe grandmother, because she spoke 
so simply and convincingly. 

But the best of all her stories was the one which told 
how Our Lady went about the suffering earth, and 
how she commanded the woman-brigand, or the 
"Amazon-chief" Engalichev, not to kill or rob Russian 
people. And after that came the stories about Blessed 
Alexei ; about Ivan the Warrior, and Vassili the Wise ; 
of the Priest Kozlya, and the beloved child of God; and 
the terrible stories of Martha Posadnitz, of Baba 
Ustye the robber chief, of Mary the sinner of Egypt, 
and of sorrowing mothers of robber sons. The fairy- 
tales, and stories of old times, and the poems which she 
knew were without number. 

She feared no one — neither grandfather, nor devils, 
nor any of the powers of evil; but she was terribly 
afraid of black cockroaches, and could feel their pres- 



MY CHILDHOOD 89 

ence when they were a long way from her. Sometimes 
she would wake me in the night whispering : 

"Oleysha, dear, there is a cockroach crawling about. 
Do get rid of it, for goodness' sake." 

Half-asleep, I would light the candle and creep about 
on the floor seeking the enemy — a quest in which I did 
not always succeed at once. 

"No, there's not a sign of one," I would say; but 
lying quite still with her head muffled up in the bed- 
clothes, she would entreat me in a faint voice : 

"Oh, yes, there is one there ! Do look again, please. 
I am sure there is one about somewhere." 

And she was never mistaken. Sooner or later I 
found the cockroach, at some distance from the bed; 
and throwing the blanket off her she would breathe a 
sigh of relief and smile as she said : 

"Have you killed it? Thank God! Thank you." 

If I did not succeed in discovering the insect, she 
could not go to sleep again, and I could feel how she 
trembled in the silence of the night; and I heard her 
whisper breathlessly : 

"It is by the door. Now it has crawled under the 
trunk." 

"Why are you so frightened of cockroaches?" 

"I don't know myself," she would answer, reasonably 
enough. "It is the way the horrid black things crawl 
about. God has given a meaning to all other vermin : 



go MY CHILDHOOD 

woodlice show that the house is damp ; bugs mean that 
the walls are dirty ; lice foretell an illness, as every one 
knows ; but these creatures ! — who knows what powers 
they possess, or what they live on 4 ?" 

• •••■••a 

One day when she was on her knees, conversing 
earnestly with God, grandfather, throwing open the 
door, shouted hoarsely : 

"Well, Mother, God has afflicted us again. We 
are on fire." 

"What are you talking about ?" cried grandmother, 
jumping up from the floor; and they both rushed into 
the large parlor, making a great noise with their feet. 
"Eugenia, take down the icons. Natalia, dress the 
baby." 

Grandmother gave her orders in a stern voice of 
authority, but all grandfather did was to mutter: 
"Ug— h!" 

I ran into the kitchen. The window looking on to 
the yard shone like gold, and yellow patches of light 
appeared on the floor, and Uncle Jaakov, who was 
dressing, trod on them with his bare feet, and jumped 
about as if they had burned him, shrieking: 

"This is Mischka's doing. He started the fire, and 
then went out." 

"Peace, cur!" said grandmother, pushing him to- 
wards the door so roughly that he nearly fell. 



MY CHILDHOOD 91 

Through the frost on the window-panes the burning 
roof of the workshop was visible, with the curling flames 
pouring out from its open door. It was a still night, 
and the color of the flames was not spoiled by any ad- 
mixture of smoke; while just above them hovered a 
dark cloud which, however, did not hide from our sight 
the silver stream of the Mlethchna Road. The snow 
glittered with a livid brilliance, and the walls of the 
house tottered and shook from side to side, as if about 
to hurl themselves into that burning corner of the yard 
where the flames disported themselves so gaily as they 
poured through the broad red cracks in the walls of the 
workshop, dragging crooked, red-hot nails out with 
them. Gold and red ribbons wound themselves about 
the dark beams of the roof, and soon enveloped it en- 
tirely; but the slender chimney-pot stood up straight in 
the midst of it all, belching forth clouds of smoke. A 
gentle crackling sound like the rustle of silk beat against 
our windows, and all the time the flames were spread- 
ing till the workshop, adorned by them, as it were, 
looked like the iconostasis in church, and became more 
and more attractive to me. 

Throwing a heavy fur coat over my head and thrust- 
ing my feet into the first boots that came handy, I ran 
out to the porch and stood on the steps, stupefied and 
blinded by the brilliant play of light, dazed by the 
yells of my grandfather, and uncles, and Gregory, and 



92 MY CHILDHOOD 

alarmed by grandmother's behavior, for she had 
wrapped an empty sack round her head, enveloped her 
body in a horse-cloth, and was running straight into the 
flames. She disappeared, crying, "The vitriol, you 
fools! It will explode!" 

"Keep her back, Gregory!" roared grandfather. 
"Aie ! she's done for— !" 

But grandmother reappeared at this moment, black- 
ened with smoke, half-fainting, bent almost double over 
the bottle of vitriolic oil which she was carrying in her 
stretched-out hands. 

"Father, get the horse out!" she cried hoarsely, 
coughing and spluttering, "and take this thing off my 
shoulders. Can't you see it is on fire?" 

Gregory dragged the smoldering horse-cloth from 
her shoulders, and then, working hard enough for two 
men, went on shoveling large lumps of snow into the 
door of the workshop. My uncle jumped about him 
with an ax in his hands, while grandfather ran round 
grandmother, throwing snow over her ; then she put the 
bottle into a snowdrift, and ran to the gate, where there 
were a great many people gathered together. After 
greeting them, she said: 

"Save the warehouse, neighbors ! If the fire fastens 
upon the warehouse and the hay-loft, we shall be burnt 
out; and it will spread to your premises. Go and pull 



MY CHILDHOOD 93 

off the roof and drag the hay into the garden! 
Gregory, why don't you throw some of the snow on top, 
instead of throwing it all on the ground 4 ? Now, 
Jaakov, don't dawdle about! Give some axes and 
spades to these good folk. Dear neighbors, behave like 
true friends, and may God reward you !" 

She was quite as interesting to me as the fire. Illu- 
minated by those flames which had so nearly devoured 
her, she rushed about the yard — a black figure, giving 
assistance at all points, managing the whole thing, and 
letting nothing escape her attention. 

Sharapa ran into the yard, rearing and nearly throw- 
ing grandfather down. The light fell on his large eyes 
which shone expressively; he breathed heavily as his 
forefeet pawed the air, and grandfather let the reins 
fall, and jumping aside called out: "Catch hold of 
him, Mother!" 

She threw herself almost under the feet of the rear- 
ing horse, and stood in front of him, with outstretched 
arms in the form of a cross; the animal neighed piti- 
fully and let himself be drawn towards her, swerving 
aside at the flames. 

"Now, you are not frightened," said grandmother in 
a low voice, as he patted his neck and grasped the reins, 
"Do you think I would leave you when you are in such 
a state*? Oh, you silly little mouse !" 



94 MY CHILDHOOD 

And the little "mouse," who was twice as large as 
herself, submissively went to the gate with her, snuf- 
fling, and gazing at her red face. 

Nyanya Eugenia had brought some muffled-up 
youngsters, who were bellowing in smothered tones, 
from the house. 

"Vassili Vassilitch," she cried, "we can't find Alexei 
anywhere !" 

"Go away ! Go away !" answered grandfather, wav- 
ing his hands, and I hid myself under the stairs so that 
Nyanya should not take me away. 

The roof of the workshop had fallen in by this time, 
and the stanchions, smoking, and glittering like golden 
coal, stood out against the sky. With a howl and a 
crash a green, blue and red tornado burst inside the 
building, and the flames threw themselves with a new 
energy on the yard and on the people who were gathered 
round and throwing spadefuls of snow on the huge bon- 
fire. 

The heat caused the vats to boil furiously; a thick 
cloud of steam and smoke arose, and a strange odor, 
which caused one's eyes to water, floated into the yard. 
I crept out from beneath the stairs and got under grand- 
mother's feet. 

"Get away!" she shrieked. "You will get trampled 
on. Get away!" 



MY CHILDHOOD 95 

At this moment a man on horseback, with a copper 
helmet, burst into the 3^ard. His roan-colored horse 
was covered with froth, and he raised a whip high above 
his head and shouted threateningly : 

"Make way there !" 

Bells rang out hurriedly and gaily; it was just as 
beautiful as a festival day. 

Grandmother pushed me back towards the steps. 

"What did I tell you? Go away !" 

I could not disobey her at such a time, so I went 
back to the kitchen and glued myself once more to the 
window; but I could not see the fire through that dense 
mass of people — I could see nothing but the gleam of 
copper helmets amongst the winter caps of fur. 

In a short time the fire was got under, totally ex- 
tinguished, and the building submerged. The police 
drove the onlookers away, and grandmother came into 
the kitchen. 

"Who is this? Oh, it is you ! Why are n't you in 
bed? Frightened, eh? There 's nothing to be fright- 
ened about; it is all over now." 

She sat beside me in silence, shaking a little. The 
return of the quiet night with its darkness was a relief. 
Presently grandfather came in, and standing in the 
doorway said : 

"Mother?" 



96 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Yes?" 

"Were you burned?" 

"A little — nothing to speak of." 

He lit a brimstone match, which lit up his soot-be- 
grimed face, looked for and found the candle on the 
table, and then came over swiftly and sat beside grand- 
mother. 

"The best thing we can do is to wash ourselves," she 
said, for she was covered with soot too, and smelt of 
acrid smoke. 

"Sometimes," said grandfather, drawing a deep 
breath, "God is pleased to endue you with great good- 
sense." And stroking her shoulder he added with a 
grin: "Only sometimes, you know, just for an hour 
or so; but there it is all the same." 

Grandmother smiled too, and began to say some- 
thing, but grandfather stopped her, frowning : 

"We shall have to get rid of Gregory. All this 
trouble has been caused by his neglect. His working 
days are over. He is worn out. That fool Jaaschka 
is sitting on the stairs crying; you had better go to 
him." 

She stood up and went out, holding her hand up to 
her face and blowing on her fingers; and grandfather, 
without looking at me, asked softly : 

"You saw it all from the beginning of the fire, did n't 
you? Then you saw how grandmother behaved, 



MY CHILDHOOD 97 

did n't you? And that is an old woman, mind you ! — 
crushed and breaking-up — and yet you see — ! U — 
ugh, you!" 

After a long silence, during which he sat huddled 
up, he rose and snuffed the candle, as he asked me : 

"Were you frightened?" 

"No." 

"Quite right! There was nothing to be frightened 
about." 

Irritably dragging his shirt from his shoulder, he 
went to the washstand in the corner, and I could hear 
him in the darkness stamping his feet as he exclaimed : 

"A fire is a silly business. The person who causes 
a fire ought to be beaten in the market-place. He 
must be either a fool or a thief. If that was done 
there would be no more fires. Go away now, and go to 
bed! What are you sitting there for?" 

I did as he told me, but sleep was denied to me that 
night. I had no sooner laid myself down when an un- 
earthly howl greeted me, which seemed to come from 
the bed. I rushed back to the kitchen, in the middle of 
which stood grandfather, shirtless, holding a candle 
which flickered violently as he stamped his feet on the 
floor, crying: 

"Mother! Jaakov! What is that?" 

I jumped on the stove and hid myself in a corner, 
and the household was once more in a state of wild 



98 MY CHILDHOOD 

commotion; a heartrending howl beat against the ceil- 
ing and walls, increasing in sound every moment. 

It was all just the same as it had been during the 
fire. Grandfather and uncle ran about aimlessly; 
grandmother shouted as she drove them away from one 
place to another; Gregory made a great noise as he 
thrust logs into the stove and filled the iron kettle with 
water, He went about the kitchen bobbing his head 
just like an Astrakhan camel. 

"Heat the stove first," said grandmother in a tone of 
authority. 

He rushed to do her bidding, and fell over my legs. 

"Who is there ?" he cried, greatly flustered. 
"Phew! How you frightened me! You are always 
where you ought not to be." 

"What has happened?" 

"Aunt Natalia has had a little baby born to her," he 
replied calmly, jumping down to the floor. 

I remembered that my mother had not screamed like 
that when her little baby was born. 

Having placed the kettle over the fire, Gregory 
climbed up to me on the stove, and drawing a long pipe 
from his pocket, showed it to me. 

"I am taking to a pipe for the good of my eyes," he 
explained. "Grandmother advised me to take snuff, 
but I think smoking will do me more good." 

He sat on the edge of the stove with his legs crossed, 



MY CHILDHOOD 99 

looking down at the feeble light of the candle; his 
ears and cheeks were smothered in soot, one side of his 
shirt was torn, and I could see his ribs — as broad as the 
ribs of a cask. One of his eyeglasses was broken; al- 
most half of the glass had come out of the frame, and 
from the empty space peered a red, moist eye, which 
had the appearance of a wound. 

Filling his pipe with coarse-cut tobacco, he listened 
to the groans of the travailing woman, and murmured 
disjointedly, like a drunken man: 

"That grandmother of yours has burned herself so 
badly that I am sure I don't know how she can attend 
to the poor creature. Just hear how your aunt is groan- 
ing. You know, they forgot all about her. She was 
taken bad when the fire first broke out. It was fright 
that did it. You see what pain it costs to bring chil- 
dren into the world, and yet women are thought noth- 
ing of! But, mark my words — women ought to be 
thought a lot of, for they are the mothers — " 

Here I dozed, and was awakened by a tumult: a 
banging of doors, and the drunken cries of Uncle 
Michael ; these strange words floated to my ears : 

"The royal doors must be opened — !" 

"Give her holy oil with rum, half a glass of oil, half 
a glass of rum, and a tablespoonful of soot — " 

Then Uncle Michael kept asking like a tiresome 
child: 



ioo MY CHILDHOOD 

"Let me have a look at her !" 

He sat on the floor with his legs sprawling, and 
kept spitting straight in front of him, and banging his 
hands on the floor. 

I began to find the stove unbearably hot, so I slid 
down, but when I got on a level with uncle he seized 
and held me by the legs, and I fell on the back of my 
head. 

"Fool !" I exclaimed. 

He jumped to his feet, grabbed me again, and 
roared : 

"I '11 smash you against the stove — " 

I escaped to a corner of the best parlor, under the 
image, and ran against grandfather's knees; he put me 
aside, and gazing upwards, went on in a low voice : 

"There is no excuse for any of us — " 

The image-lamp burned brightly over his head, a 
candle stood on the table in the middle of the room, 
and the light of a foggy winter's morning was already 
peeping in at the window. 

Presently he bent towards me, and asked : 

"What's the matter with you?' 

Everything was the matter with me — my head was 
clammy, my body sorely weary; but I did not like to 
say so because everything about me was so strange. 
Almost all the chairs in the room were occupied by 
strangers; there were a priest in a lilac-colored robe, 



MY CHILDHOOD 101 

a gray-headed old man with glasses, in a military uni- 
form, and many other people who all sat quite still like 
wooden figures, or figures frozen, as it were, in expecta- 
tion of something, and listened to the sound of water 
splashing somewhere near. By the door stood Uncle 
Jaakov, very upright, with his hands behind his back. 
"Here!" said grandfather to him, "take this child to 
bed." 

My uncle beckoned me to follow him, and led the 
way on tiptoe to the door of grandmother's room, and 
when I had got into bed he whispered : 

"Your Aunt Natalia is dead." 

I was not surprised to hear it. She had not been 
visible for a long time, either in the kitchen or at 
meals. 

"Where is grandmother 4 ?" I asked. 

"Down there," he replied, waving his hand, and went 
out of the room, still going softly on his bare feet. 

I lay in bed and looked about me. I seemed to see 
hairy, gray, sightless faces pressed against the window- 
pane, and though I knew quite well that those were 
grandmother's clothes hanging over the box in the 
corner, I imagined that some living creature was hiding 
there and waiting. I put my head under the pillow, 
leaving one eye uncovered so that I could look at the 
door, and wished that I dared jump out of bed and run 
out of the room. It was very hot, and there was a 



102 MY CHILDHOOD 

heavy, stifling odor which reminded me of the night 
when Tsiganok died, and that rivulet of blood ran 
along the floor. 

Something in my head or my heart seemed to be 
swelling; everything that I had seen in that house 
seemed to stretch before my mind's eye, like a train 
of winter sledges in the street, and to rise up and crush 
me. 

The door opened very slowly, and grandmother crept 
into the room, and closing the door with her shoulder, 
came slowly forward; and holding out her hand to the 
blue light of the image-lamp, wailed softly, pitifully as 
a child: 

"Oh, my poor little hand! My poor hand hurts 
me so!" 



CHAPTER V 

BEFORE long another nightmare began. One eve- 
ning when we had finished tea and grandfather 
and I sat over the Psalter, while grandmother was 
washing up the cups and saucers, Uncle Jaakov burst 
into the room, as dishevelled as ever, and bearing a 
strange resemblance to one of the household brooms. 
Without greeting us, he tossed his cap into a corner 
and began speaking rapidly, with excited gestures. 

"Mischka is kicking up an utterly uncalled-for row. 
He had dinner with me, drank too much, and began to 
show unmistakable signs of being out of his mind; he 
broke up the crockery, tore up an order which had just 
been completed — it was a woolen dress — broke the 
windows, insulted me and Gregory, and now he is com- 
ing here, threatening you. He keeps shouting, T '11 
pull father's beard for him ! I '11 kill him !' so you 
had better look out." 

Grandfather rose slowly to his feet, resting his hands 
on the table. He was frowning heavily, and his face 
seemed to dry up, growing narrow and cruel, like a 
hatchet. 

"Do you hear that, Mother?" he yelled. "What do 

103 



104 MY CHILDHOOD 

you think of it, eh? Our own son coming to kill his 
father! But it is quite time; it is quite time, my 
children." 

He went up the room, straightening his shoulders, 
to the door, sharply snapped the heavy iron hook, 
which fastened it, into its ring, and turned again to 
Uncle Jaakov saying: 

"This is all because you want to get hold of Var- 
vara's dowry. That 's what it is !" 

And he laughed derisively in the face of my uncle, 
who asked in an offended tone : 

"What should J want with it?" 

"You? I know you!" 

Grandmother was silent as she hastily put the cups 
and saucers away in the cupboard. 

"Well?" cried grandfather, laughing bitterly. 
"Very good ! Thank you, my son. Mother, give this 
fox a poker, or an iron if you like. Now, Jaakov 
Vassilev, when your brother breaks in, kill him before 
my eyes !" 

My uncle thrust his hands into his pockets and re- 
tired into a corner. 

"Of course, if you won't believe me — " 

"Believe you?" cried grandfather, stamping his 
feet. "No! I '11 believe an animal — a dog, a hedge- 
hog even — but I have no faith in you. I know you too 
well. You made him drunk, and then gave him his in- 



MY CHILDHOOD 105 

structions. Very well! What are you waiting for^ 
Kill me now — him or me, you can take your choice !" 

Grandmother whispered to me softly: "Run up- 
stairs and look out of the window, and when you see 
Uncle Michael coming along the street, hurry back and 
tell us. Run along now ! Make haste !" 

A little frightened by the threatened invasion of my 
turbulent uncles, but proud of the confidence placed in 
me, I leaned out of the window which looked out upon 
the broad road, now thickly coated with dust through 
which the lumpy, rough cobblestones were just visible. 
The street stretched a long way to the left, and crossing 
the causeway continued to Ostrojni Square, where, 
firmly planted on the clay soil, stood a gray building 
with a tower at each of its four corners — the old prison, 
about which there was a suggestion of melancholy 
beauty. On the right, about three houses away, there 
was an opening in Syenia Square, which was built round 
the yellow domicile of the prison officials, and on the 
leaden-colored fire-tower, on the look-out gallery 
of the tower, revolved the figures of the watchmen, 
looking like dogs on chains. The whole square was 
cut off from the causeway — at one end stood a green 
thicket, and, more to the right, lay the stagnant Dinka 
Pond, into which, so grandmother used to tell the story, 
my uncles had thrown my father one winter, with the 
intention of drowning him. Almost opposite our 



106 MY CHILDHOOD 

windows was a lane of small houses of various colors 
which led to the dumpy, squat church of the "Three 
Apostles." If you looked straight at it the roof ap- 
peared exactly like a boat turned upside down on the 
green waves of the garden. Defaced by the snow- 
storms of a long winter, washed by the continuous rains 
of autumn, the discolored houses in our street were 
powdered with dust. They seemed to look at each 
other with half-closed eyes, like beggars in the church 
porch, and, like me, they seemed to be waiting for some 
one, and their open windows had an air of suspicion. 

There were a few people moving about the street 
in a leisurely manner, like thoughtful cockroaches on a 
warm hearth ; a suffocating heat rose up to me, and the 
detestable odor of pie and carrots and onions cooking 
forced itself upon me — a smell which always made 
me feel melancholy. 

I was very miserable — ridiculously, intolerably 
miserable ! My breast felt as if it were full of warm 
lead which pressed from within and exuded through my 
ribs. I seemed to feel myself inflating like a bladder, 
and yet there I was, compressed into that tiny room, 
under a coffin-shaped ceiling. 

There was Uncle Michael — peeping from the lane 
round the corner of the gray houses. He tried to pull 
his cap down over his ears, but they stuck out all the 
same. He was wearing a brown pea-jacket and high 



MY CHILDHOOD 107 

boots which were very dusty; one hand was in the 
pocket of his check trousers, and with the other he 
tugged at his beard. I could not see his face, but he 
stood almost as if he were prepared to dart across the 
road and seize grandfather's house in his rough, black 
hands. I ought to have run downstairs to say that he 
had come, but I could not tear myself away from the 
window, and I waited till I saw my uncle kick the dust 
about over his gray boots just as if he were afraid, and 
then cross the road. I heard the door of the wineshop 
creak, and its glass panels rattle as he opened it, before 
I ran downstairs and knocked at grandfather's door. 

"Who is it?" he asked gruffly, making no attempt to 
let me in. "Oh, it 's you ! Well, what is it?" 

"He has gone into the wineshop !" 

"All right! Run along!" 

"But I am frightened up there." 

"I can't help that." 

Again I stationed myself at the window. It was 
getting dark. The dust lay more thickly on the road, 
and looked almost black; yellow patches of light oozed 
out from the adjacent windows, and from the house 
opposite came strains of music played on several 
stringed instruments — melancholy but pleasing. 
There was singing in the tavern, too; when the door 
opened the sound of a feeble, broken voice floated out 
into the street. I recognized it as belonging to the 



108 MY CHILDHOOD 

beggar cripple, Nikitoushka — a bearded ancient, with 
one glass eye and the other always tightly closed. 
When the door banged it sounded as if his song had 
been cut off with an ax. 

Grandmother used to quite envy this beggar-man. 
After listening to his songs she used to say, with a sigh : 

"There 's talent for you ! What a lot of poetry he 
knows by heart. It 's a gift — that 's what it is !" 

Sometimes she invited him into the yard, where he 
sat on the steps and sang, or told stories, while grand- 
mother sat beside him and listened, with such exclama- 
tions as: 

"Go on. Do you mean to tell me that Our Lady 
was ever at Ryazin?" 

To which he would reply in a low voice which car- 
ried conviction with it: 

"She went everywhere — through every province." 

An elusive, dreamy lassitude seemed to float up to 
me from the street, and place its oppressive weight 
upon my heart and my eyes. I wished that grand- 
mother would come to me — or even grandfather. I 
wondered what kind of a man my father had been that 
grandfather and my uncles disliked him so, while 
grandmother and Gregory and Nyanya Eugenia spoke 
so well of him. And where was my mother? I 
thought of her more and more every day, making her the 
center of all the fairy-tales and old legends related to 



MY CHILDHOOD 109 

me by grandmother. The fact that she did not choose 
to live with her own family increased my respect for 
her. I imagined her living at an inn on a highroad, 
with robbers who waylaid rich travelers, and shared 
the spoils with beggars. Or it might be that she was 
living in a forest — in a cave, of course — with good 
robbers, keeping house for them, and taking care of 
their stolen gold. Or, again, she might be wandering 
about the earth reckoning up its treasures, as the robber- 
chieftainess Engalitchev went with Our Lady, who 
would say to her, as she said to the robber-chieftainess : 

"Do not steal, O grasping slave, 
The gold and silver from every cave ; 
Nor rob the earth of all its treasure 
For thy greedy body's pleasure." 

To which my mother would answer in the words of 
the robber-chieftainess : 

"Pardon, Lady, Virgin Blest! 
To my sinful soul give rest; 
Not for myself the gold I take, 
I do it for my young son's sake." 

And Our Lady, good-natured, like grandmother, 
would pardon her, and say: 

"Maroushka, Maroushka, of Tartar blood, 
For you, luckless one, 'neath the Cross I stood; 
Continue your journey and bear your load, 
And scatter your tears o'er the toilsome road. 



no MY CHILDHOOD 

But with Russian people please do not meddle ; 
Waylay the Mongol in the woods 
Or rob the Kalmuck of his goods." 

Thinking of this story, I lived in it, as if it had been 
a dream. I was awakened by a trampling, a tumult, 
and howls from below — in the sheds and in the yard. 
I looked out of the window and saw grandfather, Uncle 
Jaakov, and a man employed by the tavern-keeper — 
the funny-looking bartender, Melyan — pushing Uncle 
Michael through the wicker-gate into the street. He 
hit out, but they struck him on the arms, the back, and 
the neck with their hands, and then kicked him. In 
the end he went flying headlong through the gate, and 
landed in the dusty road. The gate banged, the latch 
and the bolt rattled; all that remained of the fray was 
a much ill-used cap lying in the gateway, and all was 
quiet. 

After lying still for a time, my uncle dragged him- 
self to his feet, all torn and dishevelled, and picking 
up one of the cobblestones, hurled it at the gate with 
such a resounding clangor as might have been caused 
by a blow on the bottom of a cask. Shadowy people 
crept out of the tavern, shouting, cursing, gesticulating 
violently; heads were thrust out of the windows of the 
houses round; the street was alive with people, laugh- 
ing and talking loudly. It was all like a story which 
aroused one's curiosity, but was at the same time un- 



MY CHILDHOOD 111 

pleasant and full of horrors. Suddenly the whole 
thing was obliterated; the voices died away, and every 
one disappeared from my sight. 

On a box by the door sat grandmother, doubled up, 
motionless, hardly breathing. I went and stood close 
to her and stroked her warm, soft, wet cheeks, but she 
did not seem to feel my touch, as she murmured over 
and over again hoarsely: 

"O God! have You no compassion left for me and 
my children*? Lord! have mercy — 



?» 



It seems that grandfather had only lived in that 
house in Polevoi Street for a year — from one spring to 
another — yet during that time it had acquired an un- 
pleasant notoriety. Almost every Sunday boys ran 
about our door, chanting gleefully: 

"There 's another row going on at the Kashmirins !" 
Uncle Michael generally put in an appearance in 
the evening and held the house in a state of siege all 
night, putting its occupants into a frenzy of fear: 
sometimes he was accompanied by two or three assist- 
ants — repulsive-looking loafers of the lowest class. 
They used to make their way unseen from the cause- 
way to the garden, and, once there, they indulged their 
drunken whims to the top of their bent, stripping the 
raspberry and currant bushes, and sometimes making 



112 MY CHILDHOOD 

a raid on the washhouse and breaking everything in it 
which could be broken — washing-stools, benches, 
kettles — smashing the stove, tearing up the flooring, 
and pulling down the framework of the door. 

Grandfather, grim and mute, stood at the window 
listening to the noise made by these destroyers of his 
property; while grandmother, whose form could not be 
descried in the darkness, ran about the yard, crying in a 
voice of entreaty : 

"Mischka! what are you thinking of? Mischka!" 

For answer, a torrent of abuse in Russian, hideous 
as the ravings of a madman, was hurled at her from 
the garden by the brute, who was obviously ignorant 
of the meaning, and insensible to the effect of the words 
which he vomited forth. 

I knew that I must not run after grandmother at such 
a time, and I was afraid to be alone, so I went down 
to grandfather's room; but directly he saw me, he 
cried : 

"Get out! Curse you!" 

I ran up to the garret and looked out on the yard 
and garden from the dormer-window, trying to keep 
grandmother in sight. I was afraid that they would 
kill her, and I screamed, and called out to her, but she 
did not come to me; only my drunken uncle, hearing my 
voice, abused my mother in furious and obscene lan- 
guage. 



MY CHILDHOOD 113 

On one of these evenings grandfather was unwell, 
and as he uneasily moved his head, which was swathed 
in a towel, upon his pillow, he lamented shrilly : 

"For this I have lived, and sinned, and heaped up 
riches! If it were not for the shame and disgrace of 
it, I would call in the police, and let them be taken be- 
fore the Governor to-morrow. But look at the dis- 
grace! What sort of parents are they who bring the 
law to bear on their children? Well, there 's nothing 
for you to do but to lie still under it, old man !" 

He suddenly jumped out of bed, and went, stagger- 
ingly, to the window. 

Grandmother caught his arm : "Where are you go- 
ing?" she asked. 

"Light up !" he said, breathing hard. 

When grandmother had lit the candle, he took the 
candlestick from her, and holding it close to him, as a 
soldier would hold a gun, he shouted from the window 
in loud, mocking tones : 

"Hi, Mischka! You burglar! You mangy, mad 



cur!" 



Instantly the top pane of glass was shattered to 
atoms, and half a brick fell on the table beside grand- 
mother. 

"Why don't you aim straight?" shrieked grand- 
father hysterically. 

Grandmother just took him in her arms, as she would 



114 MY CHILDHOOD 

have taken me, and carried him back to bed, saying over 
and over again in a tone of terror : 

"What are you thinking of ? What are you think- 
ing of? May God forgive you ! I can see that Siberia 
will be the end of this for him. But in his madness 
he can't realize what Siberia would mean." 

Grandfather moved his legs angrily, and sobbing 
dryly, said in a choked voice : 

"Let him kill me— !" 

From outside came howls, and the sound of 
trampling feet, and a scraping at walls. I snatched 
the brick from the table and ran to the window with 
it, but grandmother seized me in time, and hurling it 
into a corner, hissed : 

"You little devil !" 

Another time my uncle came armed with a thick 
stake, and broke into the vestibule of the house from 
the yard by breaking in the door as he stood on the top 
of the dark flight of steps. However, grandfather was 
waiting for him on the other side, stick in hand, with 
two of his tenants armed with clubs, and the tall wife 
of the innkeeper holding a rolling-pin in readiness. 
Grandmother came softly behind them, murmuring in 
tones of earnest entreaty: 

"Let me go to him! Let me have one word with 
him!" 

Grandfather was standing with one foot thrust for- 



MY CHILDHOOD 115 

ward like the man with the spear in the picture called 
"The Bear Hunt." When grandmother ran to him, he 
said nothing, but pushed her away by a movement of 
his elbow and his foot. All four were standing in 
formidable readiness. Hanging on the wall above 
them was a lantern which cast an unflattering, spas- 
modic light on their countenances. I saw all this from 
the top staircase, and I was wishing all the time that I 
could fetch grandmother to be with me up there. 

My uncle had carried out the operation of breaking 
in the door with vigor and success. It had slipped 
out of its place and was ready to spring out of the upper 
hinge — the lower one was already broken away and 
jangled discordantly. 

Grandfather spoke to his companions-in-arms in a 
voice which repeated the same jarring sound: 

"Go for his arms and legs, but let his silly head 
alone, please." 

In the wall, at the side of the door, there was a 
little window, through which you could just put your 
head. Uncle had smashed the panes, and it looked, 
with the splinters sticking out all round it, like some 
one's black eye. To this window grandmother rushed, 
and putting her hand through into the yard, waved it 
warningly as she cried: 

"Mischka! For Christ's sake go away; they will 
tear you limb from limb. Do go away!" 



n6 MY CHILDHOOD 

He struck at her with the stake he was holding. A 
broad object could be seen distinctly to pass the win- 
dow and fall upon her hand, and following on this 
grandmother herself fell; but even as she lay on her 
back she managed to call out: 

"Mischka! Mi— i— schka ! Run!" 

"Mother, where are you 4 ?" bawled grandfather in a 
terrific voice. 

The door gave way, and framed in the black lintel 
stood my uncle ; but a moment later he had been hurled, 
like a lump of mud off a spade, down the steps. 

The wife of the innkeeper carried grandmother to 
grandfather's room, to which he soon followed her, 
asking morosely : 

"Any bones broken?" 

"Och! I should think every one of them was 
broken," replied grandmother, keeping her eyes closed. 
"What have you done with him? What have you 
done with him?" 

"Have some sense!" exclaimed grandfather sternly. 
"Do you think I am a wild beast? He is lying in the 
cellar bound hand and foot, and I 've given him a good 
drenching with water. I admit it was a bad thing to 
do; but who caused the whole trouble?" 

Grandmother groaned. 

"I have sent for the bone-setter. Try and bear it 
till he comes," said grandfather, sitting beside her on 



MY CHILDHOOD 117 

the bed. "They are ruining us, Mother — and in the 
shortest time possible." 

"Give them what they ask for then." 

"What about Varvara?" 

They discussed the matter for a long time — grand- 
mother quietly and pitifully, and grandfather in loud 
and angry tones. 

Then a little, humpbacked old woman came, with an 
enormous mouth, extending from ear to ear; her lower 
jaw trembled, her mouth hung open like the mouth of 
a fish, and a pointed nose peeped over her upper lip. 
Her eyes were not visible. She hardly moved her 
feet as her crutches scraped along the floor, and she 
carried in her hand a bundle which rattled. 

It seemed to me that she had brought death to 
grandmother, and darting at her I yelled with all my 
force : 

"Go away!" 

Grandfather seized me, not too gently, and, looking 
very cross, carried me to the attic. 



CHAPTER VI 

WHEN the spring came my uncles separated — 
Jaakov remained in the town and Michael 
established himself by the river, while grandfather 
bought a large, interesting house in Polevoi Street, with 
a tavern on the ground-floor, comfortable little rooms 
under the roof, and a garden running down to the cause- 
way which simply bristled with leafless willow 
branches. 

"Canes for you !" grandfather said, merrily winking 
at me, as after looking at the garden, I accompanied 
him on the soft, slushy road. "I shall begin teaching 
you to read and write soon, so they will come in 
handy." 

The house was packed full of lodgers, with the ex- 
ception of the top floor, where grandfather had a room 
for himself and for the reception of visitors, and the 
attic, in which grandmother and I had established our- 
selves. Its window gave on to the street, and one 
could see, by leaning over the sill, in the evenings and 
on holidays, drunken men crawling out of the tavern 
and staggering up the road, shouting and tumbling 

118 



MY CHILDHOOD 119 

about. Sometimes they were thrown out into the road, 
just as if they had been sacks, and then they would try 
to make their way into the tavern again ; the door would 
bang, and creak, and the hinges would squeak, and then 
a fight would begin. It was very interesting to look 
down on all this. 

Every morning grandfather went to the workshops 
of his sons to help them to get settled, and every eve- 
ning he would return tired, depressed, and cross. 

Grandmother cooked, and sewed, and pottered about 
in the kitchen and flower gardens, revolving about some- 
thing or other all day long, like a gigantic top set 
spinning by an invisible whip ; taking snuff continually, 
and sneezing, and wiping her perspiring face as she 
said: 

"Good luck to you, good old world! Well now, 
Oleysha, my darling, isn't this a nice quiet life now? 
This is thy doing, Queen of Heaven — that everything 
has turned out so well !" 

But her idea of a quiet life was not mine. From 
morning till night the other occupants of the house ran 
in and out and up and down tumultuously, thus demon- 
strating their neighborliness — always in a hurry, yet 
always late; always complaining, and always ready to 
call out: "Akulina Ivanovna!" 

And Akulina Ivanovna, invariably amiable, and im- 
partially attentive to them all, would help herself to 



120 MY CHILDHOOD 

snuff and carefully wipe her nose and fingers on a red 
check handkerchief before replying: 

"To get rid of lice, my friend, you must wash your- 
self oftener and take baths of mint-vapor; but if the 
lice are under the skin, you should take a tablespoon- 
ful of the purest goose-grease, a teaspoonful of 
sulphur, three drops of quicksilver — stir all these 
ingredients together seven times with a potsherd in an 
earthenware vessel, and use the mixture as an ointment. 
But remember that if you stir it with a wooden or a 
bone spoon the mercury will be wasted, and that if you 
put a brass or silver spoon into it, it will do you harm 
to use it." 

Sometimes, after consideration, she would say : 

"You had better go to Asaph, the chemist at Pet- 
chyor, my good woman, for I am sure I don't know how 
to advise you." 

She acted as midwife, and as peacemaker in family 
quarrels and disputes; she would cure infantile mala- 
dies, and recite the "Dream of Our Lady," so that the 
women might learn it by heart "for luck," and was al- 
ways ready to give advice in matters of housekeeping. 

"The cucumber itself will tell you when pickling 
time comes; when it falls to the ground and gives forth 
a curious odor, then is the time to pluck it. Kvass 
must be roughly dealt with, and it does not like much 
sweetness, so prepare it with raisins, to which you may 



MY CHILDHOOD 121 

add one zolotnik to every two and a half gallons. . . . 
You can make curds in different ways. There 's the 
Donski flavor, and the Gimpanski, and the Caucasian." 

All day long I hung about her in the garden and 
in the yard, and accompanied her to neighbors' houses, 
where she would sit for hours drinking tea and telling 
all sorts of stories. I had grown to be a part of her, 
as it were, and at this period of my life I do not remem- 
ber anything so distinctly as that energetic old woman, 
who was never weary of doing good. 

Sometimes my mother appeared on the scene from 
somewhere or other, for a short time. Lofty and 
severe, she looked upon us all with her cold gray eyes, 
which were like the winter sun, and soon vanished 
again, leaving us nothing to remember her by. 

Once I asked grandmother: "Are you a witch?" 

"Well! What idea will you get into your head 
next?" she laughed. But she added in a thoughtful 
tone: "How could I be a witch? Witchcraft is a 
difficult science. Why, I can't read and write even; 
I don't even know my alphabet. Grandfather — he 's 
a regular cormorant for learning, but Our Lady never 
made me a scholar." 

Then she presented still another phase of her life to 
me as she went on : 

"I was a little orphan like you, you know. My 
mother was just a poor peasant woman — and a cripple. 



122 MY CHILDHOOD 

She was little more than a child when a gentleman took 
advantage of her. In fear of what was to come, she 
threw herself out of the window one night, and broke 
her ribs and hurt her shoulder so much that her right 
hand, which she needed most, was withered . . . and 
a noted lace-worker, too! Well, of course her em- 
ployers did not want her after that, and they dismissed 
her — to get her living as well as she could. How can 
one earn bread without hands'? So she had to beg, to 
live on the charity of others ; but in those times people 
were richer and kinder . . . the carpenters of Balak- 
hana, as well as the lace-workers, were famous, and all 
the people were for show. 

"Sometimes my mother and I stayed in the town for 
the autumn and winter, but as soon as the Archangel 
Gabriel waved his sword and drove away the winter, 
and clothed the earth with spring, we started on our 
travels again, going whither our eyes led us. To 
Mourome we went, and to Urievitz, and by the upper 
Volga, and by the quiet Oka. It was good to wander 
about the world in the spring and summer, when all the 
earth was smiling and the grass was like velvet; and 
the Holy Mother of God scattered flowers over the 
fields, and everything seemed to bring joy to one, and 
speak straight to one's heart. And sometimes, when we 
were on the hills, my mother, closing her blue eyes, 
would begin to sing in a voice which, though not power- 



MY CHILDHOOD 123 

ful, was as clear as a bell ; and listening to her, every- 
thing about us seemed to fall into a breathless sleep. 
Ah! God knows it was good to be alive in those 
days! 

"But by the time that I was nine years old, my 
mother began to feel that she would be blamed if she 
took me about begging with her any longer; in fact, 
she began to be ashamed of the life we were leading, 
and so she settled at Balakhana, and went about the 
streets begging from house to house — taking up a posi- 
tion in the church porch on Sundays and holidays, 
while I stayed at home and learned to make lace. I 
was an apt pupil, because I was so anxious to help my 
mother; but sometimes I did not seem to get on at all, 
and then I used to cry. But in two years I had learned 
the business, mind you, small as I was, and the fame of 
of it went through the town. When people wanted 
really good lace, they came to us at once : 

" 'Now, Akulina, make your bobbins fly !' " 

"And I was very happy . . . those were great days 
for me. But of course it was mother's work, not mine; 
for though she had only one hand and that one useless, 
it was she who taught me how to work. And a good 
teacher is worth more than ten workers. 

"Well, I began to be proud. 'Now, my little 
mother,' I said, 'you must give up begging, for I can 
earn enough to keep us both.' 



124 MY CHILDHOOD 

" 'Nothing of the sort !' she replied. 'What you earn 
shall be set aside for your dowry.' 

"And not long after this, grandfather came on the 
scene. A wonderful lad he was — only twenty-two, and 
already a freewater-man. His mother had had her eye 
on me for some time. She saw that I was a clever 
worker, and being only a beggar's daughter, I suppose 
she thought I should be easy to manage ; but — ! Well, 
she was a crafty, malignant woman, but we won't rake 
up all that. . . . Besides, why should we remember bad 
people? God sees them; He sees all they do; and the 
devils love them." 

And she laughed heartily, wrinkling her nose comic- 
ally, while her eyes, shining pensively, seemed to caress 
me, more eloquent even than her words. 

I remember one quiet evening having tea with grand- 
mother in grandfather's room. He was not well, and 
was sitting on his bed undressed, with a large towel 
wrapped round his shoulders, sweating profusely and 
breathing quickly and heavily. His green eyes were 
dim, his face puffed and livid; his small, pointed ears 
also were quite purple, and his hand shook pitifully as 
he stretched it out to take his cup of tea. His manner 
was gentle too; he was quite unlike himself. 

"Why have n't you given me any sugar?" he asked 
pettishly, like a spoiled child. 



MY CHILDHOOD 125 

"I have put honey in it ; it is better for you," replied 
grandmother kindly but firmly. 

Drawing in his breath and making a sound in his 
throat like the quacking of a duck, he swallowed the hot 
tea at a gulp. 

"I shall die this time," he said; "see if I don't!" 

"Don't you worry ! I will take care of you." 

"That 's all very well; but if I die now I might as 
well have never lived. Everything will fall to 
pieces." 

"Now, don't you talk. Lie quiet." 

He lay silent for a minute with closed eyes, twisting 
his thin beard round his fingers, and smacking his dis- 
colored lips together; but suddenly he shook himself as 
if some one had run a pin into him, and began to utter 
his thoughts aloud : 

"Jaaschka and Mischka ought to get married again 
as soon as possible. New ties would very likely give 
them a fresh hold on life. What do you think?" 
Then he began to search his memory for the names of 
eligible brides in the town. 

But grandmother kept silence as she drank cup after 
cup of tea, and I sat at the window looking at the eve- 
ning sky over the town as it grew redder and redder and 
cast a crimson reflection upon the windows of the 
opposite houses. As a punishment for some mis- 
demeanor, grandfather had forbidden me to go out in 



126 MY CHILDHOOD 

the garden or the yard. Round the birch trees in the 
garden circled beetles, making a tinkling sound with 
their wings; a cooper was working in a neighboring 
yard, and not far away some one was sharpening knives. 
The voices of children who were hidden by the thick 
bushes rose up from the garden and the causeway. It 
all seemed to draw me and hold me, while the melan- 
choly of eventide flowed into my heart. 

Suddenly grandfather produced a brand-new book 
from somewhere, banged it loudly on the palm of his 
hand, and called me in brisk tones. 

"Now, you young rascal, come here! Sit down! 
Now do you see these letters ? This is 'Az.' Say after 
me <Az,' c Buki,' 'Viedi.' What is this one?" 

"Buki." 

"Right! And what is this?" 

"Viedi." 

"Wrong! It is 'Az.' 

"Look at these— 'Glagol,' 'Dobro,' 'Yest.' What 
is this one?" 

"Dobro." 

"Right! And this one?" 

"Glagol." 

"Good! And this one?" 

"Az." 

"You ought to be lying still, you know, Father," put 
in grandmother. 



MY CHILDHOOD 127 

"Oh, don't bother ! This is just the thing for me; it 
takes my thoughts off myself. Go on, Lexei !" 

He put his hot, moist arm round my neck, and 
ticked off the letters on my shoulder with his fingers. 
He smelled strongly of vinegar, to which an odor of 
baked onion was added, and I felt nearly suffocated; 
but he flew into a rage and growled and roared in my 
ear: 

" 'Zemlya,' 'Loodi' !" 

The words were familiar to me, but the Slav char- 
acters did not correspond with them. "Zemlya" (Z) 
looked like a worm; "Glagol" (G) like round-shoul- 
dered Gregory; "Ya" resembled grandmother and me 
standing together; and grandfather seemed to have 
something in common with all the letters of the alpha- 
bet. 

He took me through it over and over again, some- 
times asking me the names of the letters in order, some- 
times "dodging"; and his hot temper must have been 
catching, for I also began to perspire, and to shout at 
the top of my voice — at which he was greatly amused. 
He clutched his chest as he coughed violently and tossed 
the book aside, wheezing : 

"Do you hear how he bawls, Mother? What are 
you making that noise for, you little Astrakhan maniac? 
Eh?" 

"It was you that made the noise." 



128 MY CHILDHOOD 

It was a pleasure to me then to look at him and at 
grandmother, who, with her elbows on the table, and 
cheek resting on her hand, was watching us and laugh- 
ing gently as she said : 

"You will burst yourselves with laughing if you are 
not careful." 

"I am irritable because I am unwell," grandfather 
explained in a friendly tone. "But what 's the matter 
with you, eh?" 

"Our poor Natalia was mistaken," he said to grand- 
mother, shaking his damp head, "when she said he had 
no memory. He has a memory, thank God! It is 
like a horse's memory. Get on with it, snub-nose !" 

At last he playfully pushed me off the bed. 

"That will do. You can take the book, and to- 
morrow you will say the whole alphabet to me with- 
out a mistake, and I will give you five kopecks." 

When I held out my hand for the book, he drew 
me to him and said gruffly : 

"That mother of yours does not care what becomes 
of you, my lad." 

Grandmother started. 

"Oh, Father, why do you say such things?" 

"I ought not to have said it — my feelings got the 
better of me. Oh, what a girl that is for going 
astray !" 

He pushed me from him roughly. 



MY CHILDHOOD 129 

"Run along now! You can go out, but not into 
the street; don't you dare to do that. Go to the yard 
or the garden." 

The garden had special attractions for me. As soon 
as I showed myself on the hillock there, the boys in 
the causeway started to throw stones at me, and I re- 
turned the charge with a will. 

"Here comes the ninny," they would yell as soon 
as they saw me, arming themselves hastily. "Let 's 
skin him !" 

As I did not know what they meant by "ninny," 
the nickname did not offend me; but I liked to feel 
that I was one alone fighting against the lot of them, 
especially when a well-aimed stone sent the enemy 
flying to shelter amongst the bushes. We engaged 
in these battles without malice, and they generally 
ended without any one being hurt. 

I learned to read and write easily. Grandmother 
bestowed more and more attention on me, and whip- 
pings became rarer and rarer — although in my opinion 
I deserved them more than ever before, for the 
older and more vigorous I grew the more often I broke 
grandfather's rules, and disobeyed his commands; 
yet he did no more than scold me, or shake his fist 
at me. I began to think, if you please, that he must 
have beaten me without cause in the past, and I told 
him so. 



130 MY CHILDHOOD 

He lightly tilted my chin and raised my face 
towards him, blinking as he drawled: 

"Wha— a— a— t?" 

And half-laughing, he added : 

"You heretic! How can you possibly know how 
many whippings you need? Who should know if 
not I? There! get along with you." 

But he had no sooner said this than he caught me 
by the shoulder and asked: 

"Which are you now, I wonder — crafty or simple?" 

"I don't know." 

"You don't know! Well, I will tell you this 
much — be crafty; it pays! Simple-mindedness is 
nothing but foolishness. Sheep are simple-minded, 
remember that ! That will do. Run away !" 

Before long I was able to spell out the Psalms. 
Our usual time for this was after the evening tea, 
when I had to read one Psalm. 

"B-1-e-s-s, Bless; e-d, ed; Blessed," I read, guiding 
the pointer across the page. "Blessed is the man — 
Does that mean Uncle Jaakov?" I asked, to relieve 
the tedium. 

"I'll box your ears; that will teach you who it is 
that is blessed," replied grandfather, snorting angrily; 
but I felt that his anger was only assumed, because 
he thought it was the right thing to be angry. 



MY CHILDHOOD 131 

And I was not mistaken; in less than a minute it 
was plain that he had forgotten all about me as he 
muttered : 

"Yes, yes ! King David showed himself to be very 
spiteful — in sport, and in his songs, and in the Ab- 
salom affair. Ah ! Maker of Songs, Master of Lan- 
guage, and Jester. That is what you were !" 

I left off reading to look at his frowning, wonder- 
ing face. His eyes, blinking slightly, seemed to look 
through me, and a warm, melancholy brightness shone 
from them ; but I knew that before long his usual harsh 
expression would return to them. He drummed on 
the table spasmodically with his thin fingers ; his stained 
nails shone, and his golden eyebrows moved up and 
down. 

"Grandfather!" 

"Eh?" 

"Tell me a story." 

"Get on with your reading, you lazy clown!" he 
said querulously, rubbing his eyes just as if he had 
been awakened from sleep. "You like stories, but you 
don't care for the Psalms!" 

I rather suspected that he, too, liked stories better 
than the Psalter, which he knew almost by heart, for 
he had made a vow to read it through every night 
before going to bed, which he did in a sort of chant, 
just as the deacons recite the breviary in church. 



132 MY CHILDHOOD 

At my earnest entreaty, the old man, who was grow- 
ing softer every day, gave in to me. 

"Very well, then! You will always have the 
Psalter with you, but God will be calling me to judg- 
ment before long." 

So, reclining against the upholstered back of the 
old armchair, throwing back his head and gazing at 
the ceiling, he quietly and thoughtfully began telling 
me about old times, and about his father. Once rob- 
bers had come to Balakhana, to rob Zaev, the merchant, 
and grandfather's father rushed to the belfry to sound 
the alarm; but the robbers came up after him, felled 
him with their swords, and threw him down from the 
tower. 

"But I was an infant at the time, so of course I do 
not remember anything about the affair. The first 
person I remember is a Frenchman; that was when I 
was twelve years old — exactly twelve. Three batches 
of prisoners were driven into Balakhana — all small, 
wizened people ; some of them dressed worse than beg- 
gars, and others so cold that they could hardly stand 
by themselves. The peasants would have beaten 
them to death, but the escort prevented that and drove 
them away; and there was no more trouble after that. 
We got used to the Frenchmen, who showed themselves 
to be skilful and sagacious; merry enough too . . . 



MY CHILDHOOD 133 

sometimes they sang songs. Gentlemen used to come 
out from Nijni in troikas to examine the prisoners; 
some of them abused the Frenchmen and shook their 
fists at them, and even went so far as to strike them, 
while others spoke kindly to them in their own tongue, 
gave them money, and showed them great cordiality. 
One old gentleman covered his face with his hands and 
wept, and said that that villain Bonaparte had ruined 
the French. There, you see ! He was a Russian, and 
a gentleman, and he had a good heart — he pitied those 
foreigners." 

He was silent for a moment, keeping his eyes closed, 
and smoothing his hair with his hands; then he went 
on, recalling the past with great precision. 

"Winter had cast its spell over the streets, the 
peasants' huts were frostbound, and the Frenchmen 
used sometimes to run to our mother's house and stand 
under the windows — she used to make little loaves to 
sell — and tap on the glass, shouting and jumping 
about as they asked for hot bread. Mother would not 
have them in our cottage, but she threw them the 
loaves from the window; and all hot as they were, 
they snatched them up and thrust them into their 
breasts, against their bare skin. How they bore the 
heat I cannot imagine! Many of them died of cold, 
for they came from a warm country, and were not ac- 



134 MY CHILDHOOD 

customed to frost. Two of them lived in our wash- 
house, in the kitchen garden — an officer, with his or- 
derly, Miron. 

"The officer was a tall, thin man, with his bones 
coming through his skin, and he used to go about 
wrapped in a woman's cloak which reached to his 
knees. He was very amiable, but a drunkard, and 
my mother used to brew beer on the quiet and sell it 
to him. When he had been drinking he used to sing. 
When he had learned to speak our language he used 
to air his views — 'Your country is not white at all, it 
is black — and bad!' He spoke very imperfectly, but 
we could understand him, and what he said was quite 
true. The upper banks of the Volga are not pleasing, 
but farther south the earth is warmer, and on the Cas- 
pian Sea snow is never even seen. One can believe 
that, for there is no mention of either snow or winter 
in the Gospels, or in the Acts, or in the Psalms, as far 
as I remember . . . and the place where Christ lived 
. . . Well, as soon as we have finished the Psalms we 
will read the Gospels together." 

He fell into another silence, just as if he had dropped 
off to sleep. His thoughts were far away, and his 
eyes, as they glanced sideways out of the window, 
looked small and sharp. 

"Tell me some more," I said, as a gentle reminder 
of my presence. 



MY CHILDHOOD 135 

He started, and then began again. 

"Well — we were talking about French people. 
They are human beings like ourselves, after all, not 
worse, or more sinful. Sometimes they used to call 
out to my mother, 'Madame ! Madame !' — that means 
'my lady,' f my mistress' — and she would put flour — 
five poods of it — into their sacks. Her strength was 
extraordinary for a woman; she could lift me up by 
the hair quite easily until I was twenty, and even at 
that age I was no light weight. Well, this orderly, 
Miron, loved horses; he used to go into the yard and 
make signs for them to give him a horse to groom. At 
first there was trouble about it — there were disputes and 
enmity — but in the end the peasants used to call him 
c Hi, Miron!' and he used to laugh and nod his head, 
and run to them. He was sandy, almost red-haired, 
with a large nose and thick lips. He knew all about 
horses, and treated their maladies with wonderful suc- 
cess; later on he became a veterinary surgeon at Nijni, 
but he went out of his mind and was killed in a fire. 
Towards the spring the officer began to show signs of 
breaking up, and passed quietly away, one day in early 
spring, while he was sitting at the window of the out- 
house — just sitting and thinking, with drooping head. 

"That is how his end came. I was very grieved 
about it. I cried a little, even, on the quiet. He was 
so gentle. He used to pull my ears, and talk to me 



136 MY CHILDHOOD 

so kindly in his own tongue. I could not understand 
him, but I liked to hear him — human kindness is not 
to be bought in any market. He began to teach me 
his language, but my mother forbade it, and even went 
so far as to send me to the priest, who prescribed a 
beating for me, and went himself to make a complaint 
to the officer. In those days, my lad, we were treated 
very harshly. You have not experienced anything 
like it yet. . . . What you have had to put up with 
is nothing to it, and don't you forget it! . . . Take 
my own case, for example. ... I had to go through 
so much — " 

Darkness began to fall. Grandfather seemed to 
grow curiously large in the twilight, and his eyes 
gleamed like those of a cat. On most subjects he 
spoke quietly, carefully, and thoughtfully, but when 
he talked about himself his words came quickly and 
his tone was passionate and boastful, and I did not 
like to hear him; nor did I relish his frequent and 
peremptory command : 

"Remember what I am telling you now ! Take care 
you don't forget this !" 

He told me of many things which I had no desire 
to remember, but which, without any command from 
him, I involuntarily retained in my memory, to cause 
me a morbid sickness of heart. 

He never told fictitious stories, but always related 



MY CHILDHOOD 137 

events which had really happened; and I also noticed 
that he hated to be questioned, which prompted me 
to ask persistently : 

"Who are the best — the French or the Russians?" 
"How can I tell? I never saw a Frenchman at 
home," he growled angrily. "A Pole cat is all right 
in its own hole," he added. 
"But are the Russians good?" 

"In many respects they are, but they were better 
when the landlords ruled. We are all at sixes and 
sevens now; people can't even get a living. The 
gentlefolk, of course, are to blame, because they have 
more intelligence to back them up; but that can't be 
said of all of them, but only of a few good ones who 
have already been proved. As for the others — most 
of them are as foolish as mice; they will take any- 
thing you like to give them. We have plenty of nut 
shells amongst us, but the kernels are missing; only 
nut shells, the kernels have been devoured. There 's 
a lesson for you, man ! We ought to have learned it, 
our wits ought to have been sharpened by now; but 
we are not keen enough yet." 

"Are Russians stronger than other people?" 
"We have some very strong people amongst us; but 
it is not strength which is so important, but dexterity. 
As far as sheer strength goes, the horse is our supe- 
rior." 



138 MY CHILDHOOD 

"But why did the French make war on us?" 

"Well, war is the Emperor's affair. We can't ex- 
pect to understand about it." 

But to my question: "What sort of a man was 
Bonaparte?" grandfather replied in a tone of retro- 
spection : 

"He was a wicked man. He wanted to make war 
on the whole world, and after that he wanted to make 
us all equal — without rulers, or masters; every one to 
be equal, without distinction of class, under the same 
rules, professing the same religion, so that the only 
difference between one person and another would be 
their names. It was all nonsense, of course. Lob- 
sters are the only creatures which cannot be distin- 
guished one from the other . . . but fish are divided 
into classes. The sturgeon will not associate with the 
sheat-fish, and the sterlet refuses to make a friend of 
the herring. There have been Bonapartes amongst us ; 
there was Razin (Stepan Timotheev), and Pygatch 
(Emilian Ivanov) — but I will tell you about them 
another time." 

Sometimes he would remain silent for a long time, 
gazing at me with rolling eyes, as if he had never seen 
me before, which was not at all pleasant. But he never 
spoke to me of my father or my mother. Now and 
again grandmother would enter noiselessly during these 
conversations, and taking a seat in the corner, would 



MY CHILDHOOD 139 

remain there for a long time silent and invisible. Then 
she would ask suddenly in her caressing voice : 

"Do you remember, Father, how lovely it was when 
we went on a pilgrimage to Mouron? What year 
would that be now?" 

After pondering, grandfather would answer care- 
fully: 

"I can't say exactly, but it was before the cholera. 
It was the year we caught those escaped convicts in 
the woods." 

"True, true! We were still frightened of 
them—" 

"That's right!" 

I asked what escaped convicts were, and why they 
were running about the woods; and grandfather rather 
reluctantly explained. 

"They are simply men who have run away from 
prison — from the work they have been set to do." 

"How did you catch them'?" 

"How did we catch them 4 ? Why, like little boys 
play hide-and-seek — some run away and the others look 
for them and catch them. When they were caught 
they were thrashed, their nostrils were slit, and they 
were branded on the forehead as a sign that they were 

nvicts." 

"But why?" 

"Ah! that is the question — and one I can't answer. 



140 MY CHILDHOOD 

As to which is in the wrong — the one who runs away 
or the one who pursues him — that also is a mystery !" 

"And do you remember, Father," said grandmother, 
"after the great fire, how we — ?" 

Grandfather, who put accuracy before everything 
else, asked grimly: 

"What great fire?' 

When they went over the past like this, they forgot 
all about me. Their voices and their words mingled 
so softly and so harmoniously, that it sounded some- 
times as if they were singing melancholy songs about 
illnesses and fires, about massacred people and sudden 
deaths, about clever rogues, and religious maniacs, and 
harsh landlords. 

"What a lot we have lived through! What a lot 
we have seen !" murmured grandfather softly. 

"We have n't had such a bad life, have we?' said 
grandmother. "Do you remember how well the spring 
began, after Varia was born?" 

"That was in the year '48, during the Hungarian 
Campaign ; and the day after the christening they drove 
out her godfather, Tikhon — " 

"And he disappeared," sighed grandmother. 

"Yes; and from that time God's blessings have 
seemed to flow off our house like water off a duck's 
back. Take Varvara, for instance — " 

"Now, Father, that will do!" 



MY CHILDHOOD 141 

"What do you mean — That will do'?" he asked, 
scowling at her angrily. "Our children have turned 
out badly, whichever way you look at them. What 
has become of the vigor of our youths We thought 
we were storing it up for ourselves in our children, 
as one might pack something away carefully in a bas- 
ket ; when, lo and behold, God changes it in our hands 
into a riddle without an answer!" 

He ran about the room, uttering cries as if he had 
burned himself, and groaning as if he were ill; then 
turning on grandmother he began to abuse his children, 
shaking his small, withered fist at her threateningly 
as he cried: 

"And it is all your fault for giving in to them, and 
for taking their part, you old hag!" 

His grief and excitement culminated in a tearful 
howl as he threw himself on the floor before the icon, 
and beating his withered, hollow breast with all his 
force, cried: 

"Lord, have I sinned more than others'? Why 
then—?" 

And he trembled from head to foot, and his eyes, 
wet with tears, glittered with resentment and ani- 
mosity. 

Grandmother, without speaking, crossed herself as 
she sat in her dark corner, and then, approaching him 
cautiously, said: 



142 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Now, why are you fretting like this? God knows 
what He is doing. You say that other people's chil- 
dren are better than ours, but I assure you, Father, 
that you will find the same thing everywhere — quar- 
rels, and bickerings, and disturbances. All parents 
wash away their sins with their tears; you are not 
the only one." 

Sometimes these words would pacify him, and he 
would begin to get ready for bed; then grandmother 
and I would steal away to our attic. 

But once when she approached him with soothing 
speech, he turned on her swiftly, and with all his force 
dealt her a blow in the face with his fist. 

Grandmother reeled, and almost lost her balance, 
but she managed to steady herself, and putting her 
hand to her lips, said quietly: "Fool!" And she spit 
blood at his feet; but he only gave two prolonged howls 
and raised both hands to her. 

"Go away, or I will kill you!" 

"Fool!" she repeated as she was leaving the room. 

Grandfather rushed at her, but, with haste, she 
stepped over the threshold and banged the door in his 
face. 

"Old hag!" hissed grandfather, whose face had be- 
come livid, as he clung to the door-post, clawing it 
viciously. 

I was sitting on the couch, more dead than alive, 



MY CHILDHOOD 143 

hardly able to believe my eyes. This was the first 
time he had struck grandmother in my presence, and 
I was overwhelmed with disgust at this new aspect 
of his character — at this revelation of a trait which I 
found unforgivable, and I felt as if I were being suf- 
focated. He stayed where he was, hanging on to the 
door-post, his face becoming gray and shriveled up 
as if it were covered with ashes. 

Suddenly he moved to the middle of the room, knelt 
down, and bent forward, resting his hands on the floor; 
but he straightened himself almost directly, and beat 
his breast. 

"And now, O Lord—!" 

I slipped off the warm tiles of the stove-couch, 
and crept out of the room, as carefully as if I were 
treading on ice. I found grandmother upstairs, walk- 
ing up and down the room, and rinsing her mouth at 
intervals. 

"Are you hurt?' 

She went into the corner, spit out some water into 
the hand-basin, and replied coolly: 

"Nothing to make a fuss about. My teeth are all 
right; it is only my lips that are bruised." 

"Why did he do it?' 

Glancing out of the window she said : 

"He gets into a temper. It is hard for him in his 
old age. Everything seems to turn out badly. Now 



144 MY CHILDHOOD 

you go to bed, say your prayers, and don't think any 
more about this." 

I began to ask some more questions; but with a 
severity quite unusual in her, she cried: 

"What did I say to you? Go to bed at once! I 
never heard of such disobedience !" 

She sat at the window, sucking her lip and spitting 
frequently into her handkerchief, and I undressed, 
looking at her. I could see the stars shining above her 
black head through the blue, square window. In the 
street all was quiet, and the room was in darkness. 
When I was in bed she came over to me and softly 
stroking my head, she said : 

"Sleep well ! I shall go down to him. Don't be 
anxious about me, sweetheart. It was my own fault, 
you know. Now go to sleep !" 

She kissed me and went away; but an overwhelm- 
ing sadness swept over me. I jumped out of the wide, 
soft, warm bed, and going to the window, gazed down 
upon the empty street, petrified by grief. 



CHAPTER VII 

1WAS not long in grasping the fact that there was 
one God for grandfather and another for grand- 
mother. The frequency with which this difference 
was brought to my notice made it impossible to ignore 
it. 

Sometimes grandmother woke up in the morning 
and sat a long while on the bed combing her wonder- 
ful hair. Holding her head firmly, she would draw 
the comb with its jagged teeth through every thread 
of that black, silky mane, whispering the while, not 
to wake me: 

"Bother you! The devil take you for sticking to- 
gether like this !" 

When she had thus taken all the tangles out, she 
quickly wove it into a thick plait, washed in a hurry, 
with many angry tossings of her head, and without 
washing away the signs of irritation from her large 
face, which was creased by sleep, she placed herself 
before the icon and began her real morning ablutions, 
by which her whole being was instantly refreshed. 

She straightened her crooked back, and raising her 

145 



146 MY CHILDHOOD 

head, gazed upon the round face of Our Lady of Kazan, 
and after crossing herself reverently, said in a loud, 
fierce whisper: 

"Most Glorious Virgin! Take me under thy pro- 
tection this day, dear Mother." 

Having made a deep obeisance, she straightened 
her back with difficulty, and then went on whispering 
ardently, and with deep feeling: 

"Source of our Joy! Stainless Beauty! Apple 
tree in bloom !" 

Every morning she seemed to find fresh words of 
praise; and for that reason I used to listen to her 
prayers with strained attention. 

"Dear Heart, so pure, so heavenly! My Defense 
and my Refuge! Golden Sun! Mother of God! 
Guard me from temptation; grant that I may do no 
one harm, and may not be offended by what others 
do to me thoughtlessly." 

With her dark eyes smiling, and a general air of 
rejuvenation about her, she crossed herself again, with 
that slow and ponderous movement of her hand. 

"Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a 
sinner, for Thy Mother's sake!" 

Her prayers were always non-liturgical, full of sin- 
cere praise, and very simple. 

She did not pray long in the mornings because she 
had to get the samovar ready, for grandfather kept no 



MY CHILDHOOD 147 

servants, and if the tea was not made to the moment, 
he used to give her a long and furious scolding. 

Sometimes he was up before her, and would come 
up to the attic. Finding her at prayer, he would stand 
for some minutes listening to her, contemptuously curl- 
ing his thin, dark lips, and when he was drinking his 
tea, he would growl : 

"How often have I taught you how to say your 
prayers, blockhead. But you are always mumbling 
some nonsense, you heretic! I can't think why God 
puts up with you." 

"He understands," grandmother would reply con- 
fidently, "what we don't say to Him. He looks into 
everything." 

"You cursed dullard! U — u — ugh, you!" was all 
he said to this. 

Her God was with her all day; she even spoke to 
the animals about Him. Evidently this God, with 
willing submission, made Himself subject to all crea- 
tures — to men, dogs, bees, and even the grass of the 
field; and He was impartially kind and accessible to 
every one on earth. 

Once the petted cat belonging to the innkeeper's 
wife — an artful, pretty, coaxing creature, smoke-col- 
ored with golden eyes — caught a starling in the garden. 
Grandmother took away the nearly exhausted bird and 
punished the cat, crying: 



148 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Have you no fear of God, you spiteful wretch?" 

The wife of the innkeeper and the porter laughed 
at these words, but she said to them angrily: 

"Do you think that animals don't understand about 
God? All creatures understand about Him better 
than you do, you heartless things !" 

When she harnessed Sharapa, who was growing fat 
and melancholy, she used to hold a conversation with 
him. 

"Why do you look so miserable, toiler of God? 
Why? You are getting old, my dear, that's what 
it is." And the horse would sigh and toss his head. 

And yet she did not utter the name of God as fre- 
quently as grandfather did. Her God was quite com- 
prehensible to me, and I knew that I must not tell 
lies in His presence; I should be ashamed to do so. 
The thought of Him produced such an invincible feel- 
ing of shame, that I never lied to grandmother. It 
would be simply impossible to hide anything from this 
good God ; in fact, I had not even a wish to do so. 

One day the innkeeper's wife quarreled with grand- 
father and abused him, and also grandmother, who had 
taken no part in the quarrel; nevertheless she abused 
her bitterly, and even threw a carrot at her. 

"You are a fool, my good woman," said grand- 
mother very quietly; but I felt the insult keenly, and 
resolved to be revenged on the spiteful creature. 



MY CHILDHOOD 149 

For a long time I could not make up my mind as 
to the best way to punish this sandy-haired, fat woman, 
with two chins and no eyes to speak of. From my 
own experience of feuds between people living to- 
gether, I knew that they avenged themselves on one 
another by cutting off the tails of their enemy's cat, 
by chasing his dogs, by killing his cocks and hens, by 
creeping into his cellar in the night and pouring kero- 
sene over the cabbages and cucumbers in the tubs, and 
letting the kvass run out of the barrels; but nothing 
of this kind appealed to me. I wanted something less 
crude, and more terrifying. 

At last I had an idea. I lay in wait for the inn- 
keeper's wife, and as soon as she went down to the 
cellar, I shut the trap door on her, fastened it, danced 
a jig on it, threw the key on to the roof, and rushed 
into the kitchen where grandmother was busy cook- 
ing. At first she could not understand why I was in 
such an ecstasy of joy, but when she had grasped the 
cause, she slapped me — on that part of my anatomy 
provided for the purpose, dragged me out to the yard, 
and sent me up to the roof to find the key. I gave it 
to her with reluctance, astonished at her asking for it, 
and ran away to a corner of the yard, whence I could 
see how she set the captive free, and how they laughed 
together in a friendly way as they crossed the 
yard. 



ISO MY CHILDHOOD 

i '11 pay you for this!" threatened the innkeeper's 
wife, shaking her plump nst at me; but there was a 
good-natured smile on her eyeless face. 

Grandmother dragged me back to the kitchen by 
the collar. "Why did you do that'?" she asked. 

"Because she threw a carrot at you." 

"That means that you did it for me? Very well! 
This is what I will do for you — I will horsewhip you 
and put you amongst the mice under the oven. A 
nice sort of protector you are! 'Look at a bubble 
and it will burst directly." If I were to tell grand- 
father he would skin you. Go up to the attic and 
learn your lesson." 

She would not speak to me for the rest of the day, 
but before she said her prayers that night she sat on 
the bed and uttered these memorable words in a very 
impressive tone: 

"Now. Lenka. my darling, you must keep your- 
self from meddling with the doings of grown-up per- 
sons. Grown-up people are given responsibilities and 
they have to answer for them to God; but it is not 
so with you yet ; you live by a child's conscience. Wait 
till God takes possession of your heart, and shows you 
the work you are to do, and the way you are to take. 
Do you understand? It is no business ot yours to de- 
cide who is to blame in any matter. God judges, and 
punishes; that is for Him, not for us." 



MY CHILDHOOD 151 

She was silent for a moment while she took a p:n:h 
of snuff: then, haif-siosing her right eye. she added: 

"Why. God Himself does not always know where 
the fault lies/'' 

"Doesn't God know everything''?''" I asked in as- 
tonishment. 

"If He knew everything, a lot of things that are 
done would not be done. It is as if He. the Father, 
looks and looks from Heaven at the earth, and sees 
how often we weep, how often we sob. and says : 
'My people, my dear people, how sorry I am for you !' " 

She was crying herself as she spoke: and drying 
her wet cheeks, she went into the corner to pray. 

From that time her God became still closer and still 
more comprehensible to me. 

Grandfather, in teaching me, also said that God 
was a Being — Omnipresent, Omniscient, All-seeing. 
the kind Helper of people in all their affairs : but he did 
not pray like grandmother. In the morning, before 
going to stand before the icon, he took a long time 
washing himself: then, when he was fully dressed, he 
carefully combed his sandy hair, brushed his beard, 
and looking at himself in the mirror, saw that his shirt 
sat well, and tucked his black cravat into his waistcoat 
— after which he advanced cautiously, almost stealth- 
ily, to the icon. He always stood on one particular 
board of the parquet floor, and with an expression in 



152 MY CHILDHOOD 

his eyes which made them look like the eyes of a horse, 
he stood in silence for a minute, with bowed head, and 
arms held straight down by his sides in soldier fashion ; 
then, upright, and slender as a nail, he began impres- 
sively : 

"In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and 
of the Holy Ghost." 

After these words it always seemed to me that the 
room became extraordinarily quiet; the very flies 
seemed to buzz cautiously. 

There he stood, with his head thrown back, his 
eyebrows raised and bristling, his golden beard stick- 
ing out horizontally, and recited the prayers, in a firm 
tone, as if he were repeating a lesson, and with a voice 
which was very distinct and very imperious. 

"It will be useless when the Judge comes, and every 
action is laid bare — " 

Striking himself lightly on the breast, he prayed 
fervently : 

"To Thee alone can sinners come. Oh, turn Thy 
face away from my misdeeds." 

He recited the "I believe," using the prescribed 
words only; and all the while his right leg quivered, 
as if it were noiselessly keeping time with his prayers, 
and his whole form, straining towards the icon, seemed 
to become taller, leaner, and drier — so clean he was, 
so neat, and so persistent in his demands. 



MY CHILDHOOD 153 

"Heavenly Physician, heal my soul of its long-lived 
passions. To thee, Holy Virgin, I cry from my heart; 
to thee I offer myself with fervor." 

And with his green eyes full of tears he wailed 
loudly : 

"Impute to me, my God, faith instead of works, and 
be not mindful of deeds which can by no means justify 



me!" 



Here he crossed himself frequently at intervals, 
tossing his head as if he were about to butt at some- 
thing, and his voice became squeaky and cracked. 
Later, when I happened to enter a synagogue, I realized 
that grandfather prayed like a Jew. 

By this time the samovar would have been snort- 
ing on the table for some minutes, and a hot smell of 
rye-cakes would be floating through the room. Grand- 
mother, frowning, strolled about, with her eyes on the 
floor; the sun looked cheerfully in at the window from 
the garden, the dew glistened like pearls on the trees, 
the morning air was deliciously perfumed by the smell 
of dill, and currant-bushes, and ripening apples, but 
grandfather went on with his prayers — quavering and 
squeaking. 

"Extinguish in me the flame of passion, for I am 
in misery and accursed." 

I knew all the morning prayers by heart, and even 
in my dreams I could say what was to come next, and 



154 MY CHILDHOOD 

I followed with intense interest to hear if he made 
a mistake or missed out a word — which very seldom 
happened; but when it did, it aroused a feeling of 
malicious glee in me. 

When he had finished his prayers, grandfather used 
to say "Good morning!" to grandmother and me, and 
we returned his greeting and sat down to table. Then 
I used to say to him: 

"You left out a word this morning." 

"Not really?" grandfather would say with an un- 
easy air of incredulity. 

"Yes. You should have said, This, my Faith, 
reigns supreme,' but you did not say 'reigns.' " 

"There now!" he would exclaim, much perturbed, 
and blinking guiltily. 

Afterwards he would take a cruel revenge on me for 
pointing out his mistake to him; but for the moment, 
seeing how disturbed he was, I was able to enjoy my 
triumph. 

One day grandmother said to him jokingly: 

"God must get tired of listening to your prayers, 
Father. You do nothing but insist on the same things 
over and over again." 

"What 's that 4 ?" he drawled in an ominous voice. 
"What are you nagging about nowt' 

"I say that you do not offer God so much as one little 
word from your own heart, so far as I can hear." 



MY CHILDHOOD 155 

He turned livid, and quivering with rage, jumped 
up on his chair and threw a dish at her head, yelping 
with a sound like that made by a saw on a piece of 
wood: 

"Take that, you old hag !" 

When he spoke of the omnipotence of God, he al- 
ways emphasized its cruelty above every other attri- 
bute. "Man sinned, and the Flood was sent; sinned 
again, and his towns were destroyed by fire; then God 
punished people by famine and plague, and even now 
He is always holding a sword over the earth — a scourge 
for sinners. All who have wilfully broken the com- 
mandments of God will be punished by sorrow and 
ruin." And he emphasized this by rapping his fingers 
on the table. 

It was hard for me to believe in the cruelty of God, 
and I suspected grandfather of having made it all up 
on purpose to inspire me with fear not of God but of 
himself; so I asked him frankly: 

"Are you saying all this to make me obey you?" 

And he replied with equal frankness: 

"Well, perhaps I am. Do you mean to disobey 
me again*?" 

"And how about what grandmother says?" 

"Don't you believe the old fool!" he admonished 
me sternly. "From her youth she has always been 
stupid, illiterate, and unreasonable. I shall tell her 



156 MY CHILDHOOD 

she must not dare to talk to you again on such an im- 
portant matter. Tell me, now — how many companies 
of angels are there ?" 

I gave the required answer, and then I asked : 

"Are they limited companies'?" 

"Oh, you scatterbrain !" he laughed, covering his 
eyes and biting his lips. "What have companies to do 
with God . . . they belong to life on earth . . . they 
are founded to set the laws at naught." 

"What are laws?" 

"Laws! Well, they are really derived from cus- 
tom," the old man explained, with pleased alacrity; 
and his intelligent, piercing eyes sparkled. "People 
living together agree amongst themselves — ( Such and 
such is our best course of action ; we will make a custom 
of it — a rule' ; finally it becomes a law. For example, 
before they begin a game, children will settle amongst 
themselves how it is to be played, and what rules are 
to be observed. Laws are made in the same way." 

"And what have companies to do with laws?" 

"Why, they are like an impudent fellow; they come 
along and make the laws of no account." 

"But why?" 

"Ah! that you would not understand," he replied, 
knitting his brows heavily; but afterwards, as if in ex- 
planation, he said: 

"All the actions of men help to work out God's plans. 



MY CHILDHOOD 157 

Men desire one thing, but He wills something quite 
different. Human institutions are never lasting. The 
Lord blows on them, and they fall into dust and ashes. ,, 

I had reason for being interested in "companies," 
so I went on inquisitively: 

"But what does Uncle Jaakov mean when he sings: 

"The Angels bright 
For God will fight, 
But Satan's slaves 
Are companies'"? 

Grandfather raised his hand to his beard, thus hid- 
ing his mouth, and closed his eyes. His cheeks quiv- 
ered, and I guessed that he was laughing inwardly. 

"Jaakov ought to have his feet tied together and 
be thrown into the water," he said. "There was no 
necessity for him to sing or for you to listen to that 
song. It is nothing but a silly joke which is current in 
Kalonga — a piece of schismatical, heretical nonsense." 
And looking, as it were, through and beyond me, he 
murmured thoughtfully: "U — u — ugh, you!" 

But though he had set God over mankind, as a Being 
to be very greatly feared, none the less did he, like 
grandmother, invoke Him in all his doings. 

The only saints grandmother knew were Nikolai, 
Yowry, Frola, and Lavra, who were full of kindness 
and sympathy with human-nature, and went about in 
the villages and towns sharing the life of the people, 



158 MY CHILDHOOD 

and regulating all their concerns; but grandfather's 
saints were nearly all males, who cast down idols, or 
defied the Roman emperors, and were tortured, burned 
or flayed alive in consequence. 

Sometimes grandfather would say musingly: 

"If only God would help me to sell that little house, 
even at a small profit, I would make a public thanks- 
giving to St. Nicholas." 

But grandmother would say to me, laughingly: 

"That's just like the old fool! Does he think St. 
Nicholas will trouble himself about selling a house*? 
Has n't our little Father Nicholas something better 
to do?" 

I kept by me for many years a church calendar 
which had belonged to grandfather, containing several 
inscriptions in his handwriting. Amongst others, op- 
posite the day of Joachim and Anne, was written in red 
ink, and very upright characters : 

"My benefactors, who averted a calamity." 

I remember that "calamity." 

In his anxiety about the maintenance of his very 
unprofitable children, grandfather set up as a money- 
lender, and used to receive articles in pledge secretly. 
Some one laid an information against him, and one 
night the police came to search the premises. There 
was a great fuss, but it ended well, and grandfather 
prayed till sunrise the next morning, and before break- 



MY CHILDHOOD 159 

fast, and in my presence, wrote those words in the 
calendar. 

Before supper he used to read with me the Psalms, 
the breviary, or the heavy book of Ephraim Sirine ; but 
as soon as he had supped he began to pray again, and 
his melancholy words of contrition resounded in the 
stillness of evening : 

"What can I offer to Thee, or how can I atone to 
Thee, O generous God, O King of Kings! . . . Pre- 
serve us from all evil imaginations. . . . O Lord, pro- 
tect me from certain persons ! . . . My tears fall like 
rain, and the memory of my sins ..." 

But very often grandmother said: 

"Oie, I am dog-tired! I shall go to bed without 
saying my prayers." 

Grandfather used to take me to church — to vespers 
on Saturday, and to High Mass on Sundays and fes- 
tivals — but even in church I made a distinction as to 
which God was being addressed ; whatever the priest or 
the deacon recited — that was to grandfather's God ; but 
the choir always sang to grandmother's God. Of 
course I can only crudely express this childish distinc- 
tion which I made between these two Gods, but I re- 
member how it seemed to tear my heart with terrific 
violence, and how grandfather's God aroused in my 
mind a feeling of terror and unpleasantness. A Being 
Who loved no one, He followed all of us about with 



160 MY CHILDHOOD 

His severe eyes, seeking and finding all that was ugly, 
evil, and sinful in us. Evidently He put no trust in 
man, He was always insisting on penance, and He loved 
to chastise. 

In those days my thoughts and feelings about God 
were the chief nourishment of my soul and were the 
most beautiful ones of my existence. All other im- 
pressions which I received did nothing but disgust me 
by their cruelty and squalor, and awaken in me a sense 
of repugnance and ferocity. God was the best and 
brightest of all the beings who lived about me — grand- 
mother's God, that Dear Friend of all creation; and 
naturally I could not help being disturbed by the ques- 
tion — "How is it that grandfather cannot see the Good 
God?' 

I was not allowed to run about the streets because it 
made me too excited. I became, as it were, intoxicated 
by the impressions which I received, and there was al- 
most always a violent scene afterwards. 

I had no comrades. The neighbors' children treated 
me as an enemy. I objected to their calling me "the 
Kashmirin boy," and seeing that they did it all the 
more, calling out to each other as soon as they saw me : 
"Look, here comes that brat, Kashmirin's grandson. 
Go for him!" then the fight would begin. I was 
strong for my age and active with my fists, and my ene- 
mies, knowing this, always fell upon me in a crowd; and 



MY CHILDHOOD 161 

as a rule the street vanquished me, and I returned home 
with a cut across my nose, gashed lips, and bruises all 
over my face — all in rags and smothered in dust. 

"What now 9'^ grandmother exclaimed as she met 
me, with a mixture of alarm and pity; "so you 've been 
fighting again, you young rascal ? What do you mean 
by itV 

She washed my face, and applied to my bruises cop- 
per coins or fomentations of lead, saying as she did so : 

"Now, what do you mean by all this fighting? 
You are as quiet as anything at home, but out of doors 
you are like I don't know what. You ought to be 
ashamed of yourself. I shall tell grandfather not to 
let you go out." 

Grandfather used to see my bruises, but he never 
scolded me ; he only quackled, and roared : 

"More decorations ! While you are in my house, 
young warrior, don't you dare to run about the streets; 
do you hear me?" 

I was never attracted by the street if it was quiet, 
but as soon as I heard the merry buzz of the children, 
I ran out of the yard, forgetting all about grand- 
father's prohibition. Bruises and taunts did not hurt 
me, but the brutality of the street sports — a brutality 
only too well known to me, wearying and oppressive, 
reducing one to a state of frenzy — disturbed me 
tremendously. I could not contain myself when the 



162 MY CHILDHOOD 

children baited dogs and cocks, tortured cats, drove 
away the goats of the Jews, jeered at drunken vaga- 
bonds, and at happy "Igosha with death in his pocket." 

This was a tall, withered-looking, smoke-dried indi- 
vidual clad in a heavy sheepskin, with coarse hair on 
his fleshless, rusty face. He went about the streets, 
stooping, wavering strangely, and never speaking — gaz- 
ing fixedly all the time at the ground. His iron-hued 
face, with its small, sad eyes, inspired me with an un- 
easy respect for him. Here was a man, I thought, pre- 
occupied with a weighty matter; he was looking for 
something, and it was wrong to hinder him. 

The little boys used to run after him, slinging stones 
at his broad back; and after going on for some time as 
if he did not notice them, and as if he were not even con- 
scious of the pain of the blows, he would stand still, 
throw up his head, push back his ragged cap with a spas- 
modic movement of his hands, and look about him as if 
he had but just awoke. 

"Igosha with death in his pocket! Igosha, where 
are you going? Look out, Death in your pocket!" 
cried the boys. 

He would thrust his hand in his pocket, then stoop- 
ing quickly would pick up a stone or a lump of dry 
mud from the ground, and flourish his long arms as he 
muttered abuse, which was confined always to the same 
few filthy words. The boys' vocabulary was im- 



MY CHILDHOOD 163 

measurably richer than his in this respect. Sometimes 
he hobbled after them, but his long sheepskin hindered 
him in running, and he would fall on his knees, resting 
his black hands on the ground, and looking just like the 
withered branch of a tree; while the children aimed 
stones at his sides and back, and the biggest of them 
ventured to run quite close to him and, jumping about 
him, scattered handfuls of dust over his head. 

But the most painful spectacle which I beheld in the 
streets was that of our late foreman, Gregory Ivan- 
ovitch, who had become quite blind, and now went 
about begging; looking so tall and handsome, and never 
speaking. A little gray-haired old woman held him by 
the arm, and halting under the windows, to which she 
never raised her eyes, she wailed in a squeaky voice : 
"For Christ's sake, pity the poor blind!" 
But Gregory Ivanovitch said never a word. His 
dark glasses looked straight into the walls of the houses, 
in at the windows, or into the faces of the passers-by; 
his broad beard gently brushed his stained hands; his 
lips were closely pressed together. I often saw him, 
but I never heard a sound proceed from that sealed 
mouth ; and the thought of that silent old man weighed 
upon me torturingly. I could not go to him — I never 
went near him; on the contrary, as soon as I caught 
sight of him being led along, I used to run into the 
house and say to grandmother: 



164 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Gregory is out there." 

"Is he?" she would exclaim in an uneasy, pitying 
tone. "Well, run back and give him this." 

But I would refuse curtly and angrily, and she would 
go to the gate herself and stand talking to him for a 
long time. He used to laugh, and pull his beard, but 
he said little, and that little in monosyllables. Some- 
times grandmother brought him into the kitchen and 
gave him tea and something to eat, and every time she 
did so he inquired where I was. Grandmother called 
me, but I ran away and hid myself in the yard. I could 
not go to him. I was conscious of a feeling of intoler- 
able shame in his presence, and I knew that grand- 
mother was ashamed too. Only once we discussed 
Gregory between ourselves, and this was one day when, 
having led him to the gate, she came back through the 
yard, crying and hanging her head. I went to her and 
took her hand. 

"Why do you run away from him?" she asked softly. 
"He is a good man, and very fond of you, you know." 

"Why doesn't grandfather keep him?" I asked. 

"Grandfather?" she halted, and then uttered in a 
very low voice those prophetic words: "Remember 
what I say to you now — God will punish us grievously 
for this. He will punish us — " 

And she was not wrong, for ten years later, when she 
had been laid to rest, grandfather was wandering 



MY CHILDHOOD 165 

through the streets of the town, himself a beggar, and 
out of his mind — pitifully whining under the windows : 

"Kind cooks, give me a little piece of pie — just a lit- 
tle piece of pie. U — gh, you!" 

Besides Igosha and Gregory Ivanovitch, I was greatly 
concerned about the Voronka — a woman of bad repu- 
tation, who was chased away from the streets. She 
used to appear on holidays — an enormous, dishevelled, 
tipsy creature, walking with a peculiar gait, as if with- 
out moving her feet or touching the earth — drifting 
along like a cloud, and bawling her ribald songs. Peo- 
ple in the street hid themselves as soon as they saw her, 
running into gateways, or corners, or shops ; she simply 
swept the street clean. Her face was almost blue, and 
blown out like a bladder; her large gray eyes were 
hideously and strangely wide open, and sometimes she 
groaned and cried : 

"My little children, where are you?" 

I asked grandmother who she was. 

"There is no need for you to know," she answered; 
nevertheless she told me briefly: 

"This woman had a husband — a civil-servant named 
Voronov, who wished to rise to a better position; so he 
sold his wife to his Chief, who took her away some- 
where, and she did not come home for two years. 
When she returned, both her children — a boy and a 
girl — were dead, and her husband was in prison for 



166 MY CHILDHOOD 

gambling with Government money. She took to 
drink, in her grief, and now goes about creating dis- 
turbances. No holiday passes without her being taken 
up by the police." 

Yes, home was certainly better than the street. The 
best time was after dinner, when grandfather went to 
Uncle Jaakov's workshop, and grandmother sat by the 
window and told me interesting fairy-tales, and other 
stories, and spoke to me about my father. 

The starling, which she had rescued from the cat, 
had had his broken wings clipped, and grandmother had 
skilfully made a wooden leg to replace the one which 
had been devoured. Then she taught him to talk. 
Sometimes she would stand for a whole hour in front 
of the cage, which hung from the window-frame, and, 
looking like a huge, good-natured animal, would repeat 
in her hoarse voice to the bird, whose plumage was as 
black as coal : 

"Now, my pretty starling, ask for something to eat." 

The starling would fix his small, lively, humorous 
eye upon her, and tap his wooden leg on the thin bottom 
of the cage; then he would stretch out his neck and 
whistle like a goldfinch, or imitate the mocking note of 
the cuckoo. He would try to mew like a cat, and howl 
like a dog; but the gift of human speech was denied to 
him. 

"No nonsense now!" grandmother would say quite 



MY CHILDHOOD 167 

seriously. "Say 'Give the starling something to 
eat.' " 

The little black-feathered monkey having uttered a 
sound which might have been "babushka" (grand- 
mother), the old woman would smile joyfully and feed 
him from her hand, as she said : 

"I know you, you rogue ! You are a make-believe. 
There is nothing you can't do — you are clever enough 
for anything." 

And she certainly did succeed in teaching the star- 
ling; and before long he could ask for what he wanted 
clearly enough, and, prompted by grandmother, could 
drawl : 

"Go — 00 — ood mo — — orning, my good woman!" 
At first his cage used to hang in grandfather's room, 
but he was soon turned out and put up in the attic, be- 
cause he learned to mock grandfather. He used to put 
his yellow, waxen bill through the bars of the cage while 
grandfather was saying his prayers loudly and clearly, 
and pipe: 

"Thou! Thou! Thee! The— ee! Thou!" 
Grandfather chose to take offense at this, and once 
he broke off his prayers and stamped his feet, crying 
furiously : 

"Take that devil away, or I will kill him!" 
Much that was interesting and amusing went on in 
this house; but at times I was oppressed by an inex- 



168 MY CHILDHOOD 

pressible sadness. My whole being seemed to be con- 
sumed by it; and for a long time I lived as in a dark pit, 
deprived of sight, hearing, feeling — blind and half- 
dead. 



CHAPTER VIII 

GRANDFATHER unexpectedly sold the house 
over the tavern and bought another in Kanatoroi 
Street — a ramshackle house overgrown with grass, but 
clean and quiet; and it seemed to rise up out of the 
fields, being the last of a row of little houses painted in 
various colors. 

The new house was trim and charming; its facade 
was painted in a warm but not gaudy shade of dark 
raspberry, against which the sky-blue shutters of the 
three lower windows and the solitary square of the 
shutter belonging to the attic window appeared very 
bright. The left side of the roof was picturesquely 
hidden by thick green elms and lime trees. Both in 
the yard and in the garden there were many winding 
paths, so convenient that they seemed to have been 
placed there on purpose for hide-and-seek. 

The garden was particularly good; though not large, 
it was wooded and pleasantly intricate. In one corner 
stood a small washhouse, just like a toy building; and 
in the other was a fair-sized pit, grown over with high 
grass, from which protruded the thick chimney-stack 
which was all that remained of the heating apparatus 

169 



170 MY CHILDHOOD 

of an earlier washhouse. On the left the garden was 
bounded by the wall of Colonel Ovsyanikov's stables, 
and on the right by Betlenga House; the end abutted 
on the farm belonging to the dairy- woman Petrovna — 
a stout, red, noisy female, who reminded me of a bell. 
Her little house, built in a hollow, was dark and dilapi- 
dated, and well covered with moss; its two windows 
looked out with a benevolent expression upon the held, 
the deep ravine, and the forest, which apppeared like 
a heavy blue cloud in the distance. Soldiers moved or 
ran about the fields all day long, and their bayonets 
flashed like white lightning in the slanting rays of the 
autumn sun. 

The house was filled with people who seemed to me 
very wonderful. On the first floor lived a soldier from 
Tartary with his little, buxom wife, who shouted from 
morn till night, and laughed, and played on a richly 
ornamented guitar, and sang in a high flute-like voice. 
This was the song she sang most often : 

"There 's one you love, but her love you will miss, 

Seek on ! another you must find. 
And you will find her — for reward a kiss — 

Seven times as beautiful and kind. 
Oh, what a glo — or — i — ous reward !" 

The soldier, round as a ball, sat at the window and 
puffed out his blue face, and roguishly turned his red- 
dish eyes from side to side, as he smoked his everlast- 



MY CHILDHOOD 171 

ing pipe, and occasionally coughed, and giggled with a 
strange, doglike sound: 

"Vookh! Voo— kh!" 

In the comfortable room which had been built over 
the cellar and the stables, lodged two draymen — little, 
gray-haired Uncle Peter and his dumb nephew Stepa — 
a smooth, easy-going fellow, whose face reminded me 
of a copper tray — and a long-limbed, gloomy Tartar, 
Valei, who was an officer's servant. All these people 
were to me a complete novelty — magnificent "un- 
knowns." But the one who attracted my attention and 
held it in a special degree, was the boarder, nicknamed 
"Good-business." He rented a room at the back of 
the house, next to the kitchen — a long room with two 
windows, one looking on the garden, the other on the 
yard. He was a lean, stooping man with a white face 
and a black beard, cleft in two, with kind eyes over 
which he wore spectacles. He was silent and unob- 
trusive, and when he was called to dinner or tea, his in- 
variable reply was "Good-business!" so grandmother 
began to call him that both to his face and behind his 
back. It was: "Lenka! Call 'Good-business' to 
tea," or " 'Good-business,' you are eating nothing!" 

His room was blocked up and encumbered with all 
sorts of cases and thick books, which looked strange to 
me, in Russian characters. Here were also bottles con- 
taining liquids of different colors, lumps of copper and 



172 MY CHILDHOOD 

iron, and bars of lead; and from morning till night, 
dressed in a reddish leather jacket, with gray check 
trousers all smeared with different kinds of paint, and 
smelling abominable, and looking both untidy and un- 
comfortable, he melted lead, soldered some kind of 
brass articles, weighed things in small scales, roared out 
when he burned his fingers, and then patiently blew on 
them. Or he would stumblingly approach a plan on 
the wall, and polishing his glasses, sniff at it, almost 
touching the paper with his straight, curiously pallid 
nose; or he would suddenly stand still for a long time 
in the middle of the room, or at the window, with his 
eyes closed, and his head raised — as if he were in a 
state of immobile stupefaction. 

I used to climb on the roof of the shed, whence I 
could look across the yard; and in at the open window 
I could see the blue light of the spirit-lamp on the table, 
and his dark figure as he wrote something in a tattered 
notebook, with his spectacles gleaming with a bluish 
light, like ice. The wizard-like employment of this 
man often kept me on the roof for hours together, with 
my curiosity excited to a tormenting pitch. Sometimes 
he stood at the window, as if he were framed in it, with 
his hands behind him, looking straight at the roof; but 
apparently he did not see me, a fact which gave me 
great offense. Suddenly he would start back to the 



MY CHILDHOOD 173 

table, and bending double, would begin to rummage 
about. 

I think that if he had been rich and better dressed I 
should have been afraid of him; but he was poor — a 
dirty shirt collar could be seen above the collar of his 
coat, his trousers were soiled and patched, and the slip- 
pers on his bare feet were down-trodden — and the poor 
are neither formidable nor dangerous. I had uncon- 
sciously learned this from grandmother's pitiful respect, 
and grandfather's contempt for them. 

Nobody in the house liked "Good-business." They 
all made fun of him. The soldier's lively wife nick- 
named him "Chalk-nose," Uncle Peter used to call him 
"The Apothecary" or "The Wizard," and grandfather 
described him as "The Black Magician" or "That Free- 
mason." 

"What does he do?" I asked grandmother. 

"That is no business of yours. Hold your tongue !" 

But one day I plucked up courage to go to his win- 
dow, and concealing my nervousness with difficulty, I 
asked him, "What are you doing*?" 

He started, and looked at me for a long time over 
the top of his glasses; then stretching out his hand, 
which was covered with scars caused by burns, he said: 

"Climb up!" 

His proposal that I should enter by the window in- 



174 MY CHILDHOOD 

stead of the door raised him still higher in my estima- 
tion. He sat on a case, and stood me in front of him ; 
then he moved away and came back again quite close to 
me, and asked in a low voice: 

"And where do you come from?" 

This was curious, considering that I sat close to him 
at table in the kitchen four times a day. 

"I am the landlord's grandson," I replied. 

"Ah — yes," he said, looking at his fingers. 

He said no more, so I thought it necessary to explain 
to him : 

"I am not a Kashmirin — my name is Pyeshkov." 

"Pyeshkov*?" he repeated incredulously. "Good- 
business !" 

Moving me on one side, he rose, and went to the 
table, saying: 

"Sit still now." 

I sat for a long, long time watching him as he scraped 
a filed piece of copper, put it through a press, from 
under which the filings fell, like golden groats, on to a 
piece of cardboard. These he gathered up in the palm 
of his hand and shook them into a bulging vessel, to 
which he added white dust, like salt, which he took 
from a small bowl, and some fluid out of a dark bottle. 
The mixture in the vessel immediately began to hiss 
and to smoke, and a biting smell rose to my nostrils 
which caused me to cough violently. 



MY CHILDHOOD 175 

"Ah!" said the wizard in a boastful tone. "That 
smells nasty, does n't it?" 

"Yes!" 

"That's right! That shows that it has turned out 
well, my boy." 

"What is there to boast about?" I said to myself; 
and aloud I remarked severely : 

"If it is nasty it can't have turned out well." 

"Really!" he exclaimed, with a wink. "That does 
not always follow, my boy. However — Do you 
play knuckle-bones?" 

"You mean dibs?" 

"That 's it." 

"Yes." 

"Would you like me to make you a thrower?" 

"Very well, let me have the dibs then." 

He came over to me again, holding the steaming 
vessel in his hand; and peeping into it with one eye, 
he said : 

"I '11 make you a thrower, and you promise not to 
come near me again — is that agreed?" 

I was terribly hurt at this. 

"I will never come near you again, never!" And 
I indignantly left him and went out to the garden, 
where grandfather was bustling about, spreading 
manure round the roots of the apple trees, for it was 
autumn and the leaves had fallen long ago. 



176 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Here ! you go and clip the raspberry bushes," said 
grandfather, giving me the scissors. 

"What work is it that 'Good-business' does'?" I 
asked. 

"Work — why, he is damaging his room, that 's all. 
The floor is burned, and the hangings soiled and torn. 
I shall tell him he 'd better shift." 

"That 's the best thing he can do," I said, beginning 
to clip the dried twigs from the raspberry bushes. 

But I was too hasty. 

On wet evenings, whenever grandfather went out, 
grandmother used to contrive to give an interesting little 
party in the kitchen, and invited all the occupants of 
the house to tea. The draymen, the officer's servant, 
the robust Petrovna often came, sometimes even the 
merry little lodger, but always "Good-business" was to 
be found in his corner by the stove, motionless and 
mute. Dumb Stepa used to play cards with the 
Tartar. Valei would bang the cards on the deaf man's 
broad nose and yell : 

"Your deal !" 

Uncle Peter brought an enormous chunk of white 
bread, and some jam in large, tall pots ; he cut the bread 
in slices, which he generously spread with jam, and dis- 
tributed the delicious raspberry-strewn slices to all, pre- 
senting them on the palm of his hand and bowing 
low. 



MY CHILDHOOD 177 

"Do me the favor of eating this," he would beg 
courteously; and after any one had accepted a slice, he 
would look carefully at his dark hand, and if he noticed 
any drops of jam on it, he would lick them off. 

Petrovna brought some cherry liqueur in a bottle, 
the merry lady provided nuts and sweets, and so the 
feast would begin, greatly to the content of the dear, 
fat grandmother. 

Very soon after "Good-business" had tried to bribe 
me not to go and see him any more, grandmother gave 
one of her evenings. 

A light autumn rain was falling; the wind howled, 
the trees rustled and scraped the walls with their 
branches; but in the kitchen it was warm and cozy 
as we all sat close together, conscious of a tranquil 
feeling of kindness towards one another, while grand- 
mother, unusually generous, told us story after story, 
each one better than the other. She sat on the ledge 
of the stove, resting her feet on the lower ledge, bend- 
ing towards her audience with the light of a little tin 
lamp thrown upon her. Always when she was in a 
mood for story-telling she took up this position. 

"I must be looking down on you," she would ex- 
plain. "I can always talk better that way." 

I placed myself at her feet on the broad ledge, al- 
most on a level with the head of "Good-business," and 
grandmother told us the fine story of Ivan the Warrior, 



178 MY CHILDHOOD 

and Miron the Hermit, in a smooth stream of pithy, 
well-chosen words. 

"Once lived a wicked captain — Gordion, 
His soul was black, his conscience was of stone; 
He hated truth, victims he did not lack, 
Fast kept in chains, or stretched upon the rack, 
And, like an owl, in hollow tree concealed, 
So lived this man, in evil unrevealed. 
But there was none who roused his hate and fear 
Like Hermit Miron, to the people dear. 
Mild and benign, but fierce to fight for truth, 
His death was planned without remorse or ruth. 
The captain calls — most trusted of his band — 
Ivan the Warrior, by whose practiced hand 
The Monk, unarmed and guileless, must be slain. 
Tvan !' he said, 'too long that scheming brain 
Of Hermit Miron has defied my power. 
This proud Monk merits death, and now the hour 
Has struck when he must say farewell to earth. 
A curse he has been to it, from his birth. 
Go, seize him by his venerable beard, 
And to me bring the head which cowards have feared. 
My dogs with joy shall greedily devour 
The head of him who thirsted after power.' 
Ivan, obedient, went upon his way; 
But to himself he bitterly did say: 
'It is not I who do this wicked deed; 
I go because my master I must heed.' 
His sharp word he hid lest it should betray 
The evil designs in his mind that day. 
The Monk he salutes with dissembling voice: 
'To see you in health I greatly rejoice! 



MY CHILDHOOD 179 

Your blessing, my Father! And God bless you!' 

The Monk laughed abrutly, his words were few: 

'Enough, Ivan ! Your lies do not deceive. 

That God knows all, I hope you do believe. 

Against His will, nor good nor ill is done. 

I know, you see, why you to me have come.' 

In shame before the Monk Ivan stood still; 

In fear of this man he had come to kill. 

From leathern sheath his sword he proudly drew; 

The shining blade he rubbed till it looked new. 

T meant to take you unawares,' he said ; 

'To kill you prayerless ; now I am afraid. 

To God you now shall have some time to pray. 

I '11 give you time for all you want to say, 

For me, for you, for all, born and unborn, 

And then I '11 send you where your prayers have gone/ 

The Hermit knelt; above him spread an oak 

Which bowed its head before him. Then he spoke, 

In archness smiling. 'Oh, Ivan, think well! 

How long my prayer will take I cannot tell. 

Had you not better kill me straight away 

Lest waiting tire you, furious at delay?' 

Ivan in anger frowned, and said in boast, 

'My word is given, and though at my post 

You keep me a century, I will wait. 

So pray in peace, nor your ardor abate.' 

The shadows of even fell on the Monk, 

And all through the night in prayer he was sunk; 

From dawn till sunset, through another night; 

From golden summer days to winter's blight 

So ran on, year by year, old Miron's prayer. 

And to disturb him Ivan did not dare. 

The sapling oak its lofty branches reared 

Into the sky, while all around appeared 



180 MY CHILDHOOD 

Its offshoots, into a thick forest grown. 

And all the time the holy prayer went on, 

And still continues to this very day. 

The old man softly to his God doth pray, 

And to Our Lady, the mother of all, 

To help men and women who faint and fall, 

To succor the weak, to the sad give joy. 

Ivanushka, Warrior, stands close by, 

His bright sword long has been covered with dust, 

Corroded his armor by biting rust, 

Long fallen to pieces his brave attire. 

His body is naked and covered with mire. 

The heat does but sear, no warmth does impart; 

Such fate as his would freeze the stoutest heart. 

Fierce wolves and savage bears from him do flee, 

From snowstorm and from frost alike he 's free ; 

No strength has he to move from that dread spot 

Or lift his hands. To speak is not his lot. 

Let us be warned by his terrible fate, 

Nor of meek obedience let us prate. 

If we are ordered to do something wrong, 

Our duty is then to stand firm and be strong. 

But for us sinners still the Hermit prays, 

Still flows his prayer to God, e'en in these days — 

A dear, bright river, flowing to the sea." 

Before grandmother had reached the end of her story, 
I had noticed that "Good-business" was, for some 
reason, agitated; he was fidgeting restlessly with his 
hands, taking off his spectacles and putting them on 
again, or waving them to keep time with the rhythm of 
the words, nodding his head, putting his fingers into 



MY CHILDHOOD 181 

his eyes, or rubbing them energetically, and passing the 
palms of his hands over his forehead and cheeks, as if 
he were perspiring freely. When any one of the 
others moved, coughed, or scraped his feet on the floor, 
the boarder hissed: "Ssh!"; and when grandmother 
ceased speaking, and sat rubbing her perspiring face 
with the sleeve of her blouse, he jumped up noisily, and 
putting out his hands as if he felt giddy, he babbled : 

"I say ! That 's wonderful ! It ought to be written 
down; really, it ought. It is terribly true too. . .. . 
Our . . ." 

Every one could see now that he was crying; his eyes 
were full of tears, which flowed so copiously that his 
eyes were bathed in them — it was a strange and pitiful 
sight. He looked so comical as he ran about the 
kitchen, or rather clumsily hopped about — swinging his 
glasses before his nose; desirous of putting them on 
again but unable to slip the wires over his ears — that 
Uncle Peter laughed, and the others were silent from 
embarrassment. Grandmother said harshly: 

"Write it down by all means, if you like. There 's 
no harm in that. And I know plenty more of the same 
kind." 

"No, that is the only one I want. It is — so — 
dreadfully Russian!" cried the boarder excitedly; and 
standing stock-still in the middle of the kitchen, he be- 
gan to talk loudly, clearing the air with his right hand, 



182 MY CHILDHOOD 

and holding his glasses in the other. He spoke for 
some time in a frenzied manner, his voice rising to a 
squeak, stamping his feet, and often repeating him- 
self: 

"If we are ordered to do something wrong our duty 
is then to be firm and strong. True ! True !" 

Then suddenly his voice broke, he ceased speaking, 
looked round on all of us, and quietly left the room, 
hanging his head with a guilty air. 

The other guests laughed, and glanced at each other 
with expressions of embarrassment. Grandmother 
moved farther back against the stove, into the shadow, 
and was heard to sigh heavily. 

Rubbing the palm of her hand across her thick red 
lips, Petrovna observed : 

"He seems to be in a temper." 

"No," replied Uncle Peter; "that 's only his way." 

Grandmother left the stove, and in silence began to 
heat the samovar; and Uncle Peter added, in a slow 
voice : 

"The Lord makes people like that sometimes — 
freaks." 

"Bachelors always play the fool," Valei threw out 
gruffly, at which there was a general laugh ; but Uncle 
Peter drawled: 

"He was actually in tears. It is a case of the pike 
nibbling what the roach hardly — " 



MY CHILDHOOD 183 

I began to get tired of all this. I was conscious of a 
heartache. I was greatly astonished by the behavior of 
"Good-business," and very sorry for him. I could not 
get his swimming eyes out of my mind. 

That night he did not sleep at home, but he returned 
the next day, after dinner — quiet, crushed, obviously 
embarrassed. 

"I made a scene last night," he said to grandmother, 
with the air of a guilty child. "You are not angry?" 

"Why should I be angry?" 

"Why, because I interrupted . . . and talked . . ." 

"You offended no one." 

I felt that grandmother was afraid of him. She 
did not look him in the face, and spoke in a subdued 
tone, and was quite unlike herself. 

He drew near to her and said with amazing sim- 
plicity: 

"You see, I am so terribly lonely. I have no one be- 
longing to me. I am always silent — silent; and then, 
all on a sudden, my soul seems to boil over, as if it had 
been torn open. At such times I could speak to stones 
and trees — " 

Grandmother moved away from him. 

"If you were to get married now," she began. 

"Eh?" he cried, wrinkling up his face, and ran out, 
throwing his arms up wildly. 

Grandmother looked after him frowning, and took a 



184 MY CHILDHOOD 

pinch of snuff; after which she sternly admonished 
me: 

"Don't you hang round him so much. Do you hear 4 ? 
God knows what sort of a man he is !" 

But I was attracted to him afresh. I had seen how 
his face changed and fell when he said "terribly 
lonely"; there was something in those words which I 
well understood, and my heart was touched. I went 
to find him. 

I looked, from the yard, into the window of his 
room; it was empty, and looked like a lumber-room 
into which had been hurriedly thrown all sorts of un- 
wanted things — as unwanted and as odd as its occu- 
pier. I went into the garden, and there I saw him by 
the pit. He was bending over, with his hands behind 
his head, his elbows resting on his knees, and was seated 
uncomfortably on the end of a half-burnt plank. The 
greater part of this plank was buried in the earth, but 
the end of it struck out, glistening like coal, above the 
top of the pit, which was grown over with nettles. 

The very fact of his being in such an uncomfortable 
place made me look upon this man in a still more favor- 
able light. He did not notice me for some time; he 
was gazing beyond me with his half-blind, owl-like 
eyes, when he suddenly asked in a tone of vexation : 

"Did you want me for anything?" 

"No." 



MY CHILDHOOD 185 

'Why are you here then?" 

"I could n't say." 

He took off his glasses, polished them with his red 
and black spotted handkerchief, and said : 

"Well, climb up here." 

When I was sitting beside him, he put his arm round 
my shoulders and pressed me to him. 

"Sit down. Now let us sit still and be quiet. Will 
that suit you 4 ? This is the same — ■ Are you obsti- 
nate?" 

"Yes." 

"Good-business !" 

We were silent a long time. It was a quiet, mild 
evening, one of those melancholy evenings of late sum- 
mer, when, in spite of the profusion of flowers, signs 
of decay are visible, and every hour brings impoverish- 
ment; when the earth, having already exhausted its 
luxuriant summer odors, smells of nothing but a chill 
dampness; when the air is curiously transparent, and 
the daws dart aimlessly to and fro against the red sky, 
arousing a feeling of unhappiness. Silence reigned; 
and any sound, such as the fluttering of birds or the 
rustling of fallen leaves, struck one as being unnaturally 
loud, and caused a shuddering start, which soon died 
away into that torpid stillness which seemed to en- 
compass the earth and cast a spell over the heart. In 
such moments as these are born thoughts of a peculiar 



186 MY CHILDHOOD 

purity — ethereal thoughts, thin, transparent as a cob- 
web, incapable of being expressed in words. They 
come and go quickly, like falling stars, kindling a flame 
of sorrow in the soul, soothing and disturbing it at the 
same time; and the soul is, as it were, on fire, and, 
being plastic, receives an impression which lasts for all 
time. 

Pressed close to the boarder's warm body, I gazed, 
with him, through the black branches of the apple tree, 
at the red sky, following the flight of the flapping rooks, 
and noticing how the dried poppy-heads shook on their 
stems, scattering their coarse seeds ; and I observed the 
ragged, dark blue clouds with livid edges, which 
stretched over the fields, and the crows flying heavily 
under the clouds to their nests in the burial-ground. 

It was all beautiful; and that evening it all seemed 
especially beautiful, and in harmony with my feelings. 
Sometimes, with a heavy sigh, my companion said: 

"This is quite all right, my boy, is n't it? And you 
don't feel it damp or cold?" 

But when the sky became overcast, and the twilight, 
laden with damp, spread over everything, he said : 

"Well, it can't be helped. We shall have to go in." 

He halted at the garden gate and said softly: 

"Your grandmother is a splendid woman. Oh, what 
a treasure!" And he closed his eves with a smile and 
recited in a low, very distinct voice: 



MY CHILDHOOD 187 

" 'Let us be warned by his terrible fate, 
Nor of meek obedience let us prate. 
If we are ordered to do something wrong, 
Our duty is then to stand firm and be strong.' " 

"Don't forget that, my boy!" 

And pushing me before him, he asked : 

"Can you write?' 

"No." 

"You must learn; and when you have learned, write 
down grandmother's stories. You will find it worth 
while, my boy." 

And so we became friends ; and from that day I went 
to see "Good-business" whenever I felt inclined; and 
sitting on one of the cases, or on some rags, I used to 
watch him melt lead and heat copper till it was red-hot, 
beat layers of iron on a little anvil with an elegant- 
handled, light hammer, or work with a smooth file and 
a saw of emery, which was as fine as a thread. He 
weighed everything on his delicately adjusted copper 
scales; and when he had poured various liquids into 
bulging, white vessels, he would watch them till they 
smoked and filled the room with an acrid odor, and then 
with a wrinkled-up face he would consult a thick book, 
biting his red lips, or softly humming in his husky 
voice : 

"O Rose of Sharon— !" 

"What are you doing'?" 



188 MY CHILDHOOD 

"I am making something, my boy." 

"What?" 

"Ah — that I can't tell you. You would n't under- 
stand." 

"Grandfather says he would not be surprised if you 
were coining false money." 

"Your grandfather? M'm! Well, he says that 
for something to say. Money 's all nonsense, my 
boy." 

"How should we buy bread without it?" 

"Well, yes; we want it for that, it is true." 

"And for meat too." 

"Yes, and for meat." 

He smiled quietly, with a kindness which aston- 
ished me ; and pulling my ear, said : 

"It is no use arguing with you. You always get 
the best of it. I 'd better keep quiet." 

Sometimes he broke off his work, and sitting beside 
me he would gaze for a long time out of the window, 
watching the rain patter down on the roof, and noting 
how the grass was growing over the yard, and how the 
apple trees were being stripped of their leaves. "Good- 
business" was niggardly with his words, but what he 
said was to the point; more often than not, when he 
wished to draw my attention to something, he nudged 
me and winked instead of speaking. The yard had 
never been particularly attractive to me, but his nudges 



MY CHILDHOOD 189 

and his brief words seemed to throw a different com- 
plexion on it, and everything within sight seemed 
worthy of notice. A kitten ran about, and halting be- 
fore a shining pool gazed at its own reflection, lifting its 
soft paw as if it were going to strike it. 

"Cats are vain and distrustful," observed "Good- 
business" quietly. 

Then there was the red-gold cock Mamae, who flew 
on to the garden hedge, balanced himself, shook out 
his wings, and nearly fell; whereupon he was greatly 
put out, and muttered angrily, stretching out his 
neck: 

"A consequential general, and not over-clever at 
that." 

Clumsy Valei passed, treading heavily through the 
mud, like an old horse; his face, with its high cheek- 
bones, seemed inflated as he gazed, blinking, at the 
sky, from which the pale autumn beams fell straight 
on his chest, making the brass buttons on his coat shine 
brilliantly. The Tartar stood still and touched them 
with his crooked fingers — "just as if they were medals 
bestowed on him." 

My attachment to "Good-business" grew apace, and 
became stronger every day, till I found that he was in- 
dispensable both on days when I felt myself bitterly 
aggrieved, and in my hours of happiness. Although he 
was taciturn himself, he did not forbid me to talk about 



i 9 o MY CHILDHOOD 

anything which came into my head ; grandfather, on the 
other hand, always cut me short by his stern exclama- 
tion: 

"Don't chatter, you mill of the devil !" 

Grandmother, too, was so full of her own ideas that 
she neither listened to other people's ideas nor admitted 
them into her mind; but "Good-business" always lis- 
tened attentively to my chatter, and often said to me 
smilingly : 

"No, my boy, that is not true. That is an idea of 
your own." 

And his brief remarks were always made at the right 
time, and only when absolutely necessary; he seemed 
to be able to pierce the outer covering of my heart and 
head, and see all that went on, and even to see all the 
useless, untrue words on my lips before I had time to 
utter them — he saw them and cut them off with two 
gentle blows: 

"Untrue, boy." 

Sometimes I tried to draw out his wizard-like abili- 
ties. I made up something and told it to him as if it 
had really happened; but after listening for a time, 
he would shake his head. 

"Now — that 's not true, my boy." 

"How do you know?" 

"I can feel it, my boy." 

When grandmother went to fetch water from Syeniu 



MY CHILDHOOD 191 

Square, she often used to take me with her; and on one 
occasion we saw five citizens assault a peasant, throw- 
ing him on the ground, and dragging him about as dogs 
might do to another dog. Grandmother slipped her 
pail off the yoke, which she brandished as she flew 
to the rescue, calling to me as she went : 

"You run away now !" 

But I was frightened, and, running after her, I be- 
gan to hurl pebbles and large stones at the citizens, 
while she bravely made thrusts at them with the yoke, 
striking at their shoulders and heads. When other peo- 
ple came on the scene they ran away, and grandmother 
set to work to bathe the injured man's wounds. His 
face had been trampled, and the sight of him as he 
pressed his dirty fingers to his torn nostrils and howled 
and coughed, while the blood spurted from under his 
fingers over grandmother's face and breast, filled me 
with repugnance; she uttered a cry too, and trembled 
violently. 

As soon as I returned home I ran to the boarder and 
began to tell him all about it. He left off working, 
and stood in front of me looking at me fixedly and 
sternly from under his glasses; then he suddenly inter- 
rupted me, speaking with unusual impressiveness : 

"That 's a fine thing, I must say — very fine !" 

I was so taken up by the sight I had witnessed that 
his words did not surprise me, and I went on with 



192 MY CHILDHOOD 

my story; but he put his arm round me, and then left 
me and walked about the room uncertainly. 

"That will do," he said; "I don't want to hear any 
more. You have said all that is needful, my boy — all. 
Do you understand?" 

I felt offended, and did not answer; but on thinking 
the matter over afterwards, I have still a lively recol- 
lection of my astonishment at the discovery that he had 
stopped me at exactly the right time. I had, in truth, 
told all there was to tell. 

"Do not dwell on this incident, child; it is not a 
good thing to remember," he said. 

Sometimes on the spur of the moment he uttered 
words which I have never forgotten. I remember tell- 
ing him about my enemy Kliushnikov, a warrior from 
New Street — a fat boy with a large head, whom I could 
not conquer in battle, nor he me. "Good-business" 
listened attentively to my complaint, and then he said : 

"That 's all nonsense ! That sort of strength does 
not count. Real strength lies in swift movements. 
He who is swiftest is strongest. See*?" 

The next Sunday I used my fists more quickly, and 
easily conquered Kliushnikov, which made me pay still 
more heed to what the boarder said. 

"You must learn to grasp all kinds of things, do you 
see? It is very difficult to learn how to grasp." 

I did not understand him at all, but I involuntarily 



MY CHILDHOOD 193 

remembered this, with many other similar sayings ; but 
this one especially, because in its simplicity it was pro- 
vokingly mysterious. Surely it did not require any 
extraordinary cleverness to be able to grasp stones, a 
piece of bread, a cup or a hammer ! 

In the house, however, "Good-business" became less 
and less liked ; even the friendly cat of the merry lady 
would not jump on his knees as she jumped on the 
knees of the others, and took no notice when he called 
her kindly. I beat her for that and pulled her ears, 
and, almost weeping, told her not to be afraid of the 
man. 

"It is because my clothes smell of acids — that is why 
he will not come to me," he explained; but I knew that 
every one else, even grandmother, gave quite a differ- 
ent explanation — uncharitable, untrue, and injurious 
to him. 

"Why are you always hanging about him'?" de- 
manded grandmother angrily. "He '11 be teaching you 
something bad — you '11 see!" 

And grandfather hit me ferociously whenever I 
visited the boarder, who, he was firmly convinced, was 
a rogue. 

Naturally I did not mention to "Good-business" that 
I was forbidden to make a friend of him, but I did tell 
him frankly what was said about him in the house: 

"Grandmother is afraid of you; she says you are a 



194 MY CHILDHOOD 

black magician. And grandfather too — he says you 
are one of God's enemies, and that it is dangerous to 
have you here." 

He moved his hand about his head as if he were 
driving away flies ; but a smile spread like a blush over 
his chalk-white face, and my heart contracted, and a 
mist seemed to creep over my eyes. 

"I see !" he said softly. "It is a pity, is n't it?" 

"Yes." 

"It 's a pity, my lad — yes." 

Finally they gave him notice to quit. One day, 
when I went to him after breakfast, I found him sitting 
on the floor packing his belongings in cases, and softly 
singing to himself about the Rose of Sharon. 

"Well, it 's good-by now, my friend; I am going." 

"Why?" 

He looked at me fixedly as he said: 

"Is it possible you don't know 1 ? This room is 
wanted for your mother." 

"Who said so?" 

"Your grandfather." 

"Then he told a lie!" 

"Good-business" drew me towards him; and when 
I sat beside him on the floor, he said softly : 

"Don't be angry. I thought that you knew about it 
and would not tell me; and I thought you were not 
treating me well." 



MY CHILDHOOD 195 

So that was why he had been sad and vexed in his 
manner. 

"Listen!" he went on, almost in a whisper. "You 
remember when I told you not to come and see me?' 

I nodded. 

"You were offended, were n't you?" 

"Yes." 

"But I had no intention of offending you, child. I 
knew, you see, that if you became friendly with me, you 
would get into trouble with your family. And was n't 
I right? Now, do you understand why I said it?" 

He spoke almost like a child of my own age, and 
I was beside myself with joy at his words. I felt that 
I had known this all along, and I said : 

"I understood that long ago." 

"Well, there it is. It has happened as I said, my 
little dove !" 

The pain in my heart was almost unbearable. 

"Why do none of them like you?" 

He put his arm round me, and pressed me to him and 
answered, blinking down at me: 

"I am of a different breed — do you see? That's 
what it is. I am not like them — " 

I just held his hands, not knowing what to say; in- 
capable, in fact, of saying anything. 

"Don't be angry!" he said again; and then he whis- 
pered in my ear : "And don't cry either." But all the 



196 MY CHILDHOOD 

time his own tears were flowing freely from under his 
smeared glasses. 

After that we sat, as usual, in silence, which was 
broken at rare intervals by a brief word or two; and 
that evening he went, courteously bidding farewell to 
every one, and hugging me warmly. I accompanied 
him to the gate, and watched him drive away in the 
cart, and being violently jolted as the wheels passed 
over the hillocks of frozen mud. 

Grandmother set to work immediately to clean and 
scrub the dirty room, and I wandered about from 
corner to corner on purpose to hinder her. 

"Go away !" she cried, when she stumbled over me. 

"Why did you send him away then*?" 

"Don't talk about things you don't understand." 

"You are fools — all of you !" I said. 

She flicked me with her wet floorcloth, crying : 

"Are you mad, you little wretch 4 ?" 

"I did not mean you, but the others," I said, trying 
to pacify her; but with no success. 

At supper grandfather exclaimed : 

"Well, thank God he has gone! I should never 
have been surprised, from what I saw of him, to find 
him one day with a knife through his heart. Och ! It 
was time he went." 

I broke a spoon out of revenge, and then I relapsed 



MY CHILDHOOD 197 

into my usual state of sullen endurance. Thus ended 
my friendship with the first one of that endless chain 
of friends belonging to my own country — the verv best 
of her people. 



CHAPTER IX 

I IMAGINE myself, in my childhood, as a hive to 
which all manner of simple, undistinguished peo- 
ple brought, as the bees bring honey, their knowledge 
and thoughts about life, generously enriching my soul 
with what they had to give. The honey was often 
dirty, and bitter, but it was all the same knowledge — 
and honey. 

After the departure of "Good-business," Uncle Peter 
became my friend. He was in appearance like grand- 
father, in that he was wizened, neat, and clean ; but he 
was shorter and altogether smaller than grandfather. 
He looked like a person hardly grown-up dressed up 
like an old man for fun. His face was creased like a 
square of very fine leather, and his comical, lively eyes, 
with their yellow whites, danced amidst these wrinkles 
like siskins in a cage. His raven hair, now growing 
gray, was curly, his beard also fell into ringlets, and he 
smoked a pipe, the smoke from which — the same color 
as his hair — curled upward into rings too; his style of 
speech was florid, and abounded in quaint sayings. He 
always spoke in a buzzing voice, and sometimes very 

198 



MY CHILDHOOD 199 

kindly, but I always had an idea that he was making 
fun of everybody. 

"When I first went to her, the lady-countess Tatian 
— her name was Lexievna — said to me, 'You shall be 
blacksmith' ; but after a time she orders me to go and 
help the gardener. 'All right, I don't mind, only I 
did n't engage to work as a laborer, and it is not right 
that I should have to.' Another time she 'd say 'Now, 
Petrushka, you must go fishing.' It was all one to me 
whether I went fishing or not, but I preferred to say 
'good-by' to the fish, thank you! — and I came to the 
town as a drayman. And here I am, and have never 
been anything else. So far I have not done much good 
for myself by the change. The only thing I possess is 
the horse, which reminds me of the Countess." 

This was an old horse, and was really white, but one 
day a drunken house painter had begun to paint it in 
various colors, and had never finished his job. Its legs 
were dislocated, and altogether it looked as if it were 
made of rags sewn together; the bony head, with its 
dim, sadly drooping eyes, was feebly attached to the 
carcass by swollen veins and old, worn-out skin. Uncle 
Peter waited upon the creature with much respect, and 
called it "Tankoe." 

"Why do you call that animal by a Christian name?" 
asked grandfather one day. 

"Nothing of the kind, Vassili Vassilev, nothing of 



200 MY CHILDHOOD 

the kind — in all respect I say it. There is no such 
Christian name as Tanka — but there is 'Tatiana' !" 

Uncle Peter was educated and well-read, and he and 
grandfather used to quarrel as to which of the saints 
was the most holy; and sit in judgment, each more 
severely than the other, on the sinners of ancient times. 
The sinner who was most hardly dealt with was Absa- 
lom. Sometimes the dispute took a purely gram- 
matical form, grandfather saying that it ought to be 
"sogryeshi£^0/72, bezzakonnova£^0/?z, nepravdava- 
khom" and Uncle Peter insisting that it was "sogry- 
eshiska, bezzakormovaska, nepravdoz;^*?." 

"I say it one way, and you say it another!" said 
grandfather angrily, turning livid. Then he jeered: 
"Vasha! Skisha!" 

But Uncle Peter, enveloped in smoke, asked mali- 
ciously : 

"And what is the use of your 'Idioms'? Do you 
think God takes any notice of them? What God says 
when He listens to our prayers is : Tray how you like, 
pray what you like/ " 

"Go away, Lexei !" shrieked grandfather in a fury, 
with his green eyes flashing. 

Peter was very fond of cleanliness and tidiness. 
When he went into the yard he used to kick to one 
side any shavings, or pieces of broken crockery, or 
bones that were lying about, with the scornful remark: 



MY CHILDHOOD 201 

"These things are no use, and they get in the way." 

Although he was usually talkative, good-natured, 
and merry, there were times when his eyes became 
bloodshot and grew dim and fixed, like the eyes of 
a dead person, and he would sit, huddled up in a 
corner, morose and as dumb as his nephew. 

"What is the matter with you, Uncle Peter ?" 

"Let me alone!" he would say darkly and grimly. 

In one of the little houses in our street there lived 
a gentleman, with wens on his forehead, and the most 
extraordinary habits; on Sundays he used to sit at the 
window and shoot from a shot-gun at dogs and cats, 
hens and crows, or whatever came in his way that did 
not please him. One day he fired at the side of "Good- 
business"; the shots did not pierce his leather coat, 
but some of them fell into his pocket. I shall never 
forget the interested expression with which the boarder 
regarded the dark-blue shots. Grandfather tried to 
persuade him to make a complaint about it, but, throw- 
ing the shots into a corner of the kitchen, he replied: 

"It is not worth while." 

Another time our marksman planted a few shots 
in grandfather's leg, and he, much enraged, got up 
a petition to the authorities, and set to work to get 
the names of other sufferers and witnesses in the street; 
but the culprit suddenly disappeared. 

As for Uncle Peter, every time he heard the sound 



202 MY CHILDHOOD 

of shooting in the street — if he were at home — he used 
to hastily cover his iron-gray head with his glossy Sun- 
day cap, which had large ear-flaps, and rush to the 
gate. Here he would hide his hands behind his back 
under his coat-tails, which he would lift up in imita- 
tion of a cock, and sticking out his stomach, would 
strut solemnly along the pavement quite close to the 
marksman, and then turn back. He would do this over 
and over again, and our whole household would be 
standing at the gate; while the purple face of the war- 
like gentleman could be seen at his window, with the 
blonde head of his wife over his shoulder, and people 
coming out of Betlenga yard — only the gray, dead 
house of the Ovsyanikovs showed no signs of animation. 

Sometimes Uncle Peter made these excursions with- 
out any result, the hunter evidently not looking upon 
him as game worthy of his skill in shooting; but on 
other occasions the double-barrelled gun was discharged 
over and over again. 

"Boom! Boom!" 

With leisurely steps Uncle Peter came back to us 
and exclaimed, in great delight: 

"He sent every shot into the field !" 

Once he got some shot into his shoulder and neck; 
and grandmother gave him a lecture while she was 
getting them out with a needle : 



MY CHILDHOOD 203 

"Why on earth do you encourage the beast? He 
will blind you one of these days." 

"Impossible, Akulina Ivanna," drawled Peter con- 
temptuously. "He 's no marksman !" 

"But why do you encourage him?" 

"Do you think I am encouraging him? No ! I like 
teasing the gentleman." 

And looking at the extracted shot in his palm, he 
said: 

"He 's no marksman. But up there, at the house 
of my mistress, the Countess Tatiana Lexievna, there 
was an Army man — Marmont Ilich. He was taken 
up most of the time with matrimonial duties — hus- 
bands were in the same category as footmen with her 
— and so he was kept busy about her; but he could 
shoot, if you like — only with bullets though, grand- 
mother; he wouldn't shoot with anything else. He 
put Ignashka the Idiot at forty paces or thereabouts 
from him, with a bottle tied to his belt and placed so 
that it hung between his legs; and while Ignashka 
stood there with his legs apart laughing in his foolish 
way, Marmont Ilich took his pistol and — bang! — the 
bottle was smashed to pieces. Only, unfortunately 
Ignashka swallowed a gadfly, or something, and gave 
a start, and the bullet went into his knee, right into 
the knee-cap. The doctor was called and he took the 



204 MY CHILDHOOD 

leg off; it was all over in a minute, and the leg was 
buried ..." 

"But what about the idiot?" 

"Oh, he was all right! What does an idiot want 
with legs and arms? His idiocy brings him in more 
than enough to eat and drink. Every one loves idiots ; 
they are harmless enough. You know the saying: 'It 
is better for underlings to be fools; they can do less 
harm then.' " 

This sort of talk did not astonish grandmother, she 
had listened to it scores of times, but it made me 
rather uncomfortable, and I asked Uncle Peter: 

"Would that gentleman be able to kill any one?" 

"And why not? Of cou — rse he could! . . . He 
even fought a duel. A Uhlan, who came on a visit 
to Tatiana Lexievna, had a quarrel with Marmont, 
and in a minute they had their pistols in their hands, 
and went out to the park; and there on the path by 
the pond that Uhlan shot Marmont bang through the 
liver. Then Marmont was sent to the churchyard, and 
the Uhlan to the Caucasus . . . and the whole affair 
was over in a very short time. That is how they did 
for themselves. And amongst the peasants, and the 
rest of them, he is not talked of now. People don't 
regret him much; they never regretted him for him- 
self . . . but all the same they did grieve at one time 
— for his property." 



MY CHILDHOOD 205 

"Well, then they did n't grieve much," said grand- 
mother. 

Uncle Peter agreed with her: 

"That 's true ! . . . His property. . . yes, that 
was n't worth much." 

He always bore himself kindly towards me, spoke 
to me good-naturedly, and as if I were a grown person, 
and looked me straight in the eyes; but all the same 
there was something about him which I did not like. 
Having regaled me with my favorite jam, he would 
spread my slice of bread with what was left, he would 
bring me malted gingerbread from the town, and 
always conversed with me in a quiet and serious 
tone. 

"What are you going to do, young gentleman, when 
you grow up^ Are you going into the Army or the 
Civil Service 4 ?" 

"Into the Army." 

"Good! A soldier's life is not a hard one in these 
days. A priest's life is n't bad either ... all he has 
to do is to chant, and pray to God, and that does not 
take long. In fact, a priest has an easier job than a 
soldier . . . but a fisherman's job is easier still; that 
does not require any education at all, it is simply a 
question of habit." 

He gave an amusing imitation of the fish hovering 
round the bait, and of the way perch, mugil, and 



206 MY CHILDHOOD 

bream throw themselves about when they get caught 
on the hook. 

"Now, you get angry when grandfather whips you," 
he would say soothingly, "but you have no cause to 
be angry at that, young gentleman; whippings are a 
part of your education, and those that you get are, 
after all, mere child's play. You should just see how 
my mistress, Tatiana Lexievna, used to thrash! She 
could do it all right, she could ! And she used to keep 
a man especially for that — Christopher his name was 
— and he did his work so well that sometimes neigh- 
bors from other manor-houses sent a message to the 
Countess : Tlease, Tatiana Lexievna, send Christopher 
to thrash our footman.' And she used to let him 
go." 

In his artless manner, he would give a detailed ac- 
count of how the Countess, in a white muslin frock 
with a gauzy, sky-colored handkerchief over her head, 
would sit on the steps, by one of the pillars, in a red 
armchair, while Christopher flogged the peasants, male 
and female, in her presence. 

"And this Christopher was from Riazan, and he 
looked like a gipsy, or a Little Russian, with mus- 
taches sticking out beyond his ears, and his ugly face 
all blue where he had shaved his beard. And either he 
was a fool, or he pretended to be one so that he should 
not be asked useless questions. Sometimes he used 



MY CHILDHOOD 207 

to pour water into a cup to catch flies and cockroaches, 
which are a kind of beetle, and then he used to boil 
them over the fire. 5 ' 

I was familiar with many such stories, which I had 
heard from the lips of grandmother and grandfather. 
Though they were different, yet they were all curi- 
ously alike; each one told of people being tormented, 
jeered at, or driven away, and I was tired of them, 
and as I did not wish to hear any more, said to the 
cab-driver : 

"Tell me another kind of story." 

All his wrinkles were gathered about his mouth for 
a space, then they spread themselves to his eyes, as 
he said obligingly: 

"All right, Greedy! Well, we once had a 
cook—" 

"Who had?" 

"The Countess Tatian Lexievna." 

"Why do you call her Tatian? She was n't a man, 
was she?" 

He laughed shrilly. 

"Of course she was n't. She was a lady; but all the 
same she had whiskers. Dark she was . . . she came 
of a dark German race . . . people of the negro type 
they are. Well, as I was saying, this cook — this is a 
funny story, young gentleman." 

And this "funny story" was that the cook had spoiled 



208 MY CHILDHOOD 

a fish pasty, and had been made to eat it all up him- 
self, after which he had been taken ill. 

"It is not at all funny!" I said angrily. 

"Well, what is your idea of a funny story? Come 
on ! Let 's have it." 

"I don't know—" 

"Then hold your tongue !" And he spun out another 
dreary yarn. 

Occasionally, on Sundays and holidays, we received 
a visit from my cousins — the lazy and melancholy 
Sascha Michhailov, and the trim, omniscient Sascha 
Jaakov. Once, when the three of us had made an 
excursion up to the roof, we saw a gentleman in a 
green fur-trimmed coat sitting in the Betlenga yard 
upon a heap of wood against the wall, and playing 
with some puppies; his little, yellow, bald head was 
uncovered. One of the brothers suggested the theft 
of a puppy, and they quickly evolved an ingenious 
plan by which the brothers were to go down to the 
street and wait at the entrance to Betlenga yard, while 
I did something to startle the gentleman; and when 
he ran away in alarm they were to rush into the yard 
and seize a puppy. 

"But how am I to startle him?" 

"Spit on his bald head," suggested one of my 
cousins. 

But was it not a grievous sin to spit on a person's 



MY CHILDHOOD 209 

head? However, I had heard over and over again, 
and had seen with my own eyes, that they had done 
many worse things than that, so I faithfully performed 
my part of the contract, with my usual luck. 

There was a terrible uproar and scene; a whole 
army of men and women, headed by a young, good- 
looking officer, rushed out of Betlenga House into 
the yard, and as my two cousins were, at the very 
moment when the outrage was committed, quietly 
walking along the street, and knew nothing of my 
wild prank, I was the only one to receive a thrashing 
from grandfather, by which the inhabitants of Bet- 
lenga House were completely satisfied. 

And as I lay, all bruised, in the kitchen, there came 
to me Uncle Peter, dressed in his best, and looking 
very happy. 

"That was a jolly good idea of yours, young gentle- 
man," he whispered. "That 's just what the silly old 
goat deserved — to be spit upon! Next time — throw 
a stone on his rotten head !" 

Before me rose the round, hairless, childlike face 
of the gentleman, and I remembered how he had 
squeaked feebly and plaintively, just like the puppies, 
as he had wiped his yellow pate with his small hands, 
and I felt overwhelmed with shame, and full of hatred 
for my cousins ; but I forgot all this in a moment when 
I gazed on the drayman's wrinkled face, which quivered 



2io MY CHILDHOOD 

with a half-fearful, half-disgusted expression, like 
grandfather's face when he was beating me. 

"Go away!" I shrieked, and struck at him with my 
hands and feet. 

He tittered, and winking at me over his shoulder, 
went away. 

From that time I ceased to have any desire for in- 
tercourse with him; in fact, I avoided him. And yet 
I began to watch his movements suspiciously, with 
a confused idea that I should discover something about 
him. Soon after the incident connected with the 
gentleman of Betlenga House, something else occurred. 
For a long time I had been very curious about Ovsy- 
anikov House, and I imagined that its gray exterior 
hid a mysterious romance. 

Betlenga House was always full of bustle and 
gaiety; many beautiful ladies lived there, who were 
visited by officers and students, and from it sounds 
of laughter and singing, and the playing of musical 
instruments, continually proceeded. The very face 
of the house looked cheerful, with its brightly polished 
window-panes. 

Grandfather did not approve of it. 

"They are heretics . . . and godless people, all of 
them!" he said about its inhabitants, and he applied 
to the women an offensive term, which Uncle Peter 



MY CHILDHOOD 211 

explained to me in words equally offensive and 
malevolent. 

But the stern, silent Ovsyanikov House inspired 
grandfather with respect. 

This one-storied but tall house stood in a well-kept 
yard overgrown with turf, empty save for a well with 
a roof supported by two pillars, which stood in the 
middle. The house seemed to draw back from the 
street as if it wished to hide from it. Two of its 
windows, which had chiselled arches, were at some 
distance from the ground, and upon their dust- 
smeared panes the sun fell with a rainbow effect. 
And on the other side of the gateway stood a store- 
house, with a facade exactly like that of the house, 
even to the three windows, but they were not real ones ; 
the outlines were built into the gray wall, and the 
frames and sashes painted on with white paint. 
These blind windows had a sinister appearance, and 
the whole storehouse added to the impression which 
the house gave, of having a desire to hide and escape 
notice. There was a suggestion of mute indignation, 
or of secret pride, about the whole house, with its 
empty stables, and its coachhouse, with wide doors, 
also empty. 

Sometimes a tall old man, with shaven chin and 
white mustache, the hair of which stuck out stiffly 



212 MY CHILDHOOD 

like so many needles, was to be seen hobbling about 
the yard. At other times another old man, with 
whiskers and a crooked nose, led out of the stables a 
gray mare with a long neck — a narrow-chested crea- 
ture with thin legs, which bowed and scraped like an 
obsequious nun as soon as she came out into the yard. 
The lame man slapped her with his palms, whistling, 
and drawing in his breath noisily; and then the mare 
was again hidden in the dark stable. I used to think 
that the old man wanted to run away from the house, 
but could not because he was bewitched. 

Almost every day from noon till the evening three 
boys used to play in the yard all dressed alike in gray 
coats and trousers, with caps exactly alike, and all of 
them with round faces and gray eyes; so much alike 
that I could only tell one from the other by their 
height. 

I used to watch them through a chink in the fence; 
they could not see me, but I wanted them to know I 
was there. I liked the way they played together, so 
gaily and amicably, games which were unfamiliar to 
me; I liked their dress, and their consideration for 
each other, which was especially noticeable in the con- 
duct of the elder ones to their little brother, a funny 
little fellow, full of life. If he fell down, they 
laughed — it being the custom to laugh when any one 
has a fall — but there was no malice in their laughter, 



MY CHILDHOOD 213 

and they ran to help him up directly; and if he made 
his hands or knees dirty, they wiped his fingers and 
trousers with leaves or their handkerchiefs, and the 
middle boy said good-naturedly: 

"There, clumsy!" 

They never quarreled amongst themselves, never 
cheated, and all three were agile, strong and inde- 
fatigable. 

One day I climbed up a tree and whistled to them; 
they stood stock-still for a moment, then they calmly 
drew close together, and after looking up at me, de- 
liberated quietly amongst themselves. Thinking that 
they were going to throw stones at me, I slipped to 
the ground, filled my pockets and the front of my 
blouse with stones, and climbed up the tree again; 
but they were playing in another corner of the yard, 
far away from me, and apparently had forgotten all 
about me. I was very sorry for this; first, because I 
did not wish to be the one to begin the war, and 
secondly, because just at that moment some one called 
to them out of the window : 

"You must come in now, children." 

They went submissively, but without haste, in single 
file, like geese. 

I often sat on the tree over the fence hoping that 
they would ask me to play with them; but they never 
did. But in spirit I was always playing with them, 



214 MY CHILDHOOD 

and I was so fascinated by the games sometimes that 
I shouted and laughed aloud; whereupon all three 
would look at me and talk quietly amongst them- 
selves, whilst I, overcome with confusion, would let 
myself drop to the ground. 

One day they were playing hide-and-seek, and when 
it came to the turn of the middle brother to hide, he 
stood in the corner by the storehouse and shut his 
eyes honestly, without attempting to peep, while his 
brothers ran to hide themselves. The elder one nimbly 
and swiftly climbed into a broad sledge which was 
kept in a shed against the storehouse, but the youngest 
one ran in a comical fashion round and round the well, 
flustered by not knowing where to hide. 

"One — " shouted the elder one. "Two — " 

The little boy jumped on the edge of the well, 
seized the rope, and stepped into the bucket, which, 
striking once against the edge with a dull sound, dis- 
appeared. I was stupefied, as I saw how quickly and 
noiselessly the well-oiled wheel turned, but I realized 
in a moment the possibilities of the situation, and I 
jumped down into the yard crying: 

"He has fallen into the well !" 

The middle boy and I arrived at the edge of the 
well at the same time; he clutched at the rope and, 
feeling himself drawn upwards, loosed his hands. I 



MY CHILDHOOD 215 

was just in time to catch the rope, and the elder brother, 
having come up, helped me to draw up the bucket, 
saying : 

"Gently, please !" 

We quickly pulled up the little boy, who was very 
frightened; there were drops of blood on the fingers 
of his right hand, and his cheek was severely grazed. 
He was wet to the waist, and his face was overspread 
with a bluish pallor; but he smiled, then shuddered, 
and closed his eyes tightly, then smiled again, and said 
slowly: 

"Howe— ver did I fa— all?' 

"You must have been mad to do such a thing!" 
said the middle brother, putting his arm round him 
and wiping the blood off his face with a handkerchief; 
and the elder one said frowning: 

"We had better go in. We can't hide it anyhow — " 

"Will you be whipped?" I asked. 

He nodded, and then he said, holding out his hand : 

"How quickly you ran here !" 

I was delighted by his praise, but I had no time 
to take his hand for he turned away to speak to his 
brothers again. 

"Let us go in, or he will take cold. We will say 
that he fell down, but we need not say anything about 
the well." 



216 MY CHILDHOOD 

"No," agreed the youngest, shuddering. "We 
will say I fell in a puddle, shall we?" And they 
went away. 

All this happened so quickly that when I looked at 
the branch from which I had sprung into the yard, 
it was still shaking and throwing its yellow leaves 
about. 

The brothers did not come into the yard again for 
a week, and when they appeared again they were 
more. noisy than before; when the elder one saw me 
in the tree he called out to me kindly: 

"Come here and play with us." 

We gathered together, under the projecting roof of 
the storehouse, in the old sledge, and having surveyed 
one another thoughtfully, we held a long conversation. 

"Did they whip you?" I asked. 

"Rather!" 

It was hard for me to believe that these boys were 
whipped like myself, and I felt aggrieved about it for 
their sakes. 

"Why do you catch birds?" asked the youngest. 

"Because I like to hear them sing." 

"But you ought not to catch them; why don't you 
let them fly about as they like to?" 

"Well, I 'm not going to, so there !" 

"Won't you just catch one then and give it to me?" 

"To you! . . . What kind?" 



MY CHILDHOOD 217 

"A lively one, in a cage." 

"A siskin . . . that 's what you want." 

"The cat would eat it," said the youngest one; 
"and besides, papa would not allow us to have it." 

"No, he would n't allow it," agreed the elder. 

"Have you a mother?" 

"No," said the eldest, but the middle one corrected 
him: 

"We have a mother, but she is not ours really. Ours 
is dead." 

"And the other is called a stepmother?" I said, and 
the elder nodded "Yes." 

And they all three looked thoughtful, and their faces 
were clouded. I knew what a stepmother was like 
from the stories grandmother used to tell me, and I 
understood that sudden thoughtfulness. There they 
sat, all close together, as much alike as a row of peas 
in a pod ; and I remembered the witch-stepmother who 
took the place of the real mother by means of a trick. 

"Your real mother will come back to you again, see 
if she does n't," I assured them. 

The elder one shrugged his shoulders. 

"How can she if she is dead? Such things don't 
happen." 

"Don't happen? Good Lord ! how many times have 
the dead, even when they have been hacked to pieces, 
come to life again when sprinkled with living water? 



218 MY CHILDHOOD 

How many times has death been neither real, nor the 
work of God, but simply the evil spell cast by a wizard 
or a witch !" 

I began to tell grandmother's stories to them ex- 
citedly; but the eldest laughed at first, and said under 
his breath : 

"We know all about those fairy-tales !" 

His brothers listened in silence; the little one with 
his lips closely shut and pouting, and the middle one 
with his elbows on his knees, and holding his brother's 
hand which was round his neck. 

The evening was far advanced, red clouds hung 
over the roof, when suddenly there appeared before 
us the old man with the white mustache and cinna- 
mon-colored clothes, long, like those worn by a priest, 
and a rough fur cap. 

"And who may this be?" he asked, pointing to me. 

The elder boy stood up and nodded his head in the 
direction of grandfather's house : 

"He comes from there." 

"Who invited him in here?" 

The boys silently climbed down from the sledge, 
and went into the house, reminding me more than ever 
of a flock of geese. 

The old man gripped my shoulder like a vice and 
propelled me across the yard to the gate. I felt like 
crying through sheer terror, but he took such long, 



MY CHILDHOOD 219 

quick steps that before I had time to cry we were in 
the street, and he stood at the little gate raising his 
finger at me threateningly, as he said : 

"Don't you dare to come near me again !" 

I flew into a rage. 

"I never did want to come near you, you old 
devil !" 

Once more I was seized by his long arm and he 
dragged me along the pavement as he asked in a voice 
which was like the blow of a hammer on my head : 

"Is your grandfather at home'?" 

To my sorrow he proved to be at home, and he 
stood before the minacious old man, with his head 
thrown back and his beard thrust forward, looking 
up into the dull, round, fishy eyes as he said hastily : 

"His mother is away, you see, and I am a busy 
man, so there is no one to look after him; so I hope 
you will overlook it this time, Colonel." 

The Colonel raved and stamped about the house 
like a madman, and he was hardly gone before I was 
thrown into Uncle Peter's cart. 

"In trouble again, young gentleman?" he asked as 
he unharnessed the horse. "What are you being pun- 
ished for now?" 

When I told him, he flared up. 

"And what do you want to be friends with them 
for?" he hissed. "The young serpents! Look what 



220 MY CHILDHOOD 

they have done for you ! It is your turn now to blow 
on them; see you do it." 

He whispered like this for a long time, and all sore 
from my beating as I was, I was inclined to listen to 
him at first; but his wrinkled face quivered in a way 
which became more and more repellent to me every 
moment, and reminded me that the other boys would 
be beaten too, and undeservedly, in my opinion. 

"They ought not to be whipped; they are all good 
boys. As for you, every word you say is a lie," I 
said. 

He looked at me, and then without any warning 
cried : 

"Get out of my cart!" 

"You fool !" I yelled, jumping down to the ground. 

He ran after me across the yard, making unsuccess- 
ful attempts to catch me, and yelling in an uncanny 
voice : 

"I am a fool, am I? I tell lies, do I? You wait 
till I get you !" 

At this moment grandmother came out of the kitchen, 
and I rushed to her. 

"This little wretch gives me no peace! I am five 
times older than he is, yet he dares to come and revile 
me . . . and my mother . . . and all." 

Hearing him lie like this so brazenly, I lost my 
presence of mind, and could do nothing but stand 



MY CHILDHOOD 221 

staring at him stupidly; but grandmother replied 
sternly : 

"Now you are telling lies, Peter, there is no doubt 
about it. He would never be offensive to you or 
any one." 

Grandfather would have believed the drayman! 

From that day there was silent but none the less 
bitter warfare between us; he would try to hit me 
with his reins, without seeming to do it, he would let 
my birds out of their cage, and sometimes the cat 
would catch and eat them, and he would complain 
about me to grandfather on every possible occasion, 
and was always believed. I was confirmed in my first 
impression of him — that he was just a boy like my- 
self disguised as an old man. I unplaited his bast 
shoes, or rather I ripped a little inside the shoes so 
that as soon as he put them on they began to fall to 
pieces ; one day I put some pepper in his cap which set 
him sneezing for a whole hour, and trying with all his 
might not to leave off his work because of it. 

On Sundays he kept me under observation, and 
more than once he caught me doing what was for- 
bidden — talking to the Ovsyanikovs, and went and told 
tales to grandfather. 

My acquaintance with the Ovsyanikovs progressed, 
and gave me increasing pleasure. On a little winding 
pathway between the wall of grandfather's house and 



222 MY CHILDHOOD 

the Ovsyanikovs' fence grew elms and lindens, with 
some thick elder bushes, under cover of which I bored 
a semicircular hole in the fence, and the brothers used 
to come in turns, or perhaps two of them together, and, 
squatting or kneeling at this hole, we held long con- 
versations in subdued tones ; while one of them watched 
lest the Colonel should come upon us unawares. 

They told me how miserable their existence was, and 
it made me sad to listen to them; they talked about 
my caged birds, and of many childish matters, but they 
never spoke a single word about their stepmother or 
their father, at least, as far as I can remember. More 
often than not they asked me to tell them a story, and 
I faithfully reproduced one of grandmother's tales, and 
if I forgot anything, I would ask them to wait while 
I ran to her and refreshed my memory. This pleased 
her. 

I told them a lot about grandmother, and the eldest 
boy remarked once with a deep sigh : 

"Your grandmother seems to be good in every way. 
. . . We had a good grandmother too, once." 

He often spoke sadly like this, and spoke of things 
which had happened as if he had lived a hundred years 
instead of eleven. I remember that his hands were 
narrow, and his fingers very slender and delicate, and 
that his eyes were kind and bright, like the lights of the 
church lamps. His brothers were lovable too; they 



MY CHILDHOOD 223 

seemed to inspire confidence and to make one want to 
do the things they liked; but the eldest one was my 
favorite. 

Often I was so absorbed in our conversations that I 
did not notice Uncle Peter till he was close upon us, 
and the sound of his voice sent us flying in all direc- 
tions as he exclaimed : 

"A— gai— n?" 

I noticed that his fits of taciturnity and moroseness 
became more frequent, and I very soon learned to see 
at a glance what mood he was in when he returned 
from work. As a rule he opened the gate in a lei- 
surely manner, and its hinges creaked with a long- 
drawn-out, lazy sound; but when he was in a bad mood, 
they gave a sharp squeak, as if they were crying out in 
pain. 

His dumb nephew had been married some time and 
had gone to live in the country, so Peter lived alone 
in the stables, in a low stall with a broken window and 
a close smell of hides, tar, sweat and tobacco; and be- 
cause of that smell I would never enter his dwelling- 
place. He had taken to sleep with his lamp burning, 
and grandfather greatly objected to the habit. 

"You see! You '11 burn me out, Peter." 

"No, I shan't. Don't you worry. I stand the 
lamp in a basin of water at night," he would reply, 
with a sidelong glance. 



224 MY CHILDHOOD 

He seemed to look askance at every one now, and 
had long given over attending grandmother's eve- 
nings and bringing her jam; his face seemed to be 
shriveling, his wrinkles became much deeper, and as he 
walked he swayed from side to side and shuffled his 
feet like a sick person. 

One week-day morning grandfather and I were clear- 
ing away the snow in the yard, there having been a 
heavy fall that night, when suddenly the latch of the 
gate clanged loudly and a policeman entered the yard, 
closing the gate by setting his back against it while 
he beckoned to grandfather with a fat, gray finger. 
When grandfather went to him the policeman bent 
down so that his long-pointed nose looked exactly as 
if it were chiseling grandfather's forehead, and said 
something, but in such a low tone that I could not 
hear the words; but grandfather answered quickly: 

"Here? When? Good God!" 

And suddenly he cried, jumping about comically: 

"God bless us! Is it possible?" 

"Don't make so much noise," said the policeman 
sternly. 

Grandfather looked round and saw me. 

"Put away your spade, and go indoors," he 
said. 

I hid myself in a corner and saw them go to the 
drayman's stall, and I saw the policeman take off his 



MY CHILDHOOD 225 

right glove and strike the palm of his left hand with 
it as he said: 

"He knows we 're after him. He left the horse to 
wander about, and he is hiding here somewhere." 

I rushed into the kitchen to tell grandmother all 
about it; she was kneading dough for bread, and her 
floured head was bobbing up and down as she listened 
to me, and then said calmly: 

"He has been stealing something, I suppose. You 
run away now. What is it to do with you?" 

When I went out into the yard again grandfather 
was standing at the gate with his cap off, and his eyes 
raised to heaven, crossing himself. His face looked 
angry; he was bristling with anger, in fact, and one 
of his legs was trembling. 

"I told you to go indoors 7" he shouted, stamping 
at me; but he came with me into the kitchen, calling: 
"Come here, Mother !" 

They went into the next room, and carried on a 
long conversation in whispers; but when grandmother 
came back to the kitchen I saw at once from her ex- 
pression that something dreadful had happened. 

"Why do you look so frightened?" I asked her. 

"Hold your tongue !" she said quietly. 

All day long there was an oppressive feeling about 
the house. Grandfather and grandmother frequently 
exchanged glances of disquietude, and spoke together, 



226 MY CHILDHOOD 

softly uttering unintelligible, brief words which in- 
tensified the feeling of unrest. 

"Light lamps all over the house, Mother," grand- 
father ordered, coughing. 

We dined without appetite, yet hurriedly, as if we 
were expecting some one. Grandfather was tired, and 
puffed out his cheeks as he grumbled in a squeaky 
voice : 

"The power of the devil over man! . . . You see 
it everywhere . . . even our religious people and ec- 
clesiastics! . . . What is the reason of it, eh*?" 

Grandmother sighed. 

The hours of that silver-gray winter's day dragged 
wearily on, and the atmosphere of the house seemed 
to become increasingly disturbed and oppressive. Be- 
fore the evening another policeman came, a red, fat 
man, who sat by the stove in the kitchen and dozed, 
and when grandmother asked him : "How did they find 
this out?" he answered in a thick voice: "We find out 
everything, so don't you worry yourself!" 

I sat at the window, I remember, warming an old 
two-kopeck piece in my mouth, preparatory to an at- 
tempt to make an impression on the frozen window- 
panes of St. George and the Dragon. All of a sudden 
there came a dreadful noise from the vestibule, the 
door- was thrown open, and Petrovna shrieked de- 
liriously: 



MY CHILDHOOD 227 

"Look and see what you 've got out there !" 

Catching sight of the policeman, she darted back 
into the vestibule; but he caught her by the skirt, and 
cried fearfully: 

"Wait! Who are you? What are we to look 
for?' 

Suddenly brought to a halt on the threshold, she 
fell on her knees and began to scream; and her words 
and her tears seemed to choke her: 

"I saw it when I went to milk the cows . . . what 
is that thing that looks like a boot in the Kashmirins' 
garden? I said to myself — " 

But at this grandfather stamped his foot and 
shouted : 

"You are lying, you fool ! You could not see any- 
thing in our garden, the fence is too high and there are 
no crevices. You are lying; there is nothing in our 
garden." 

"Little Father, it is true!" howled Petrovna, stretch- 
ing out one hand to him, and pressing the other to her 
head. "It is true, little Father . . . should I lie about 
such a thing? There were footprints leading to your 
fence, and the snow was all trampled in one place, and 
I went and looked through the fence and I saw . . . 
him . . . lying there . . ." 

"Who? Who?" 

This question was repeated over and over again, 



228 MY CHILDHOOD 

but nothing more was to be got out of her. Sud- 
denly they all made a dash for the garden, jos- 
tling each other as if they had gone mad; and there, 
by the pit, with the snow softly spread over him, 
lay Uncle Peter, with his back against the burnt 
beam and his head fallen on his chest. Under 
his right ear was a deep gash, red, like a mouth, 
from which jagged pieces of flesh stuck out like 
teeth. 

I shut my eyes in horror at the sight, but I could 
see, through my eyelashes, the harness-maker's knife, 
which I knew so well, lying on Uncle Peter's knees, 
clutched in the dark fingers of his right hand; his left 
hand was cut off and was sinking into the snow. 
Under the drayman the snow had thawed, so that his 
diminutive body was sunk deep in the soft, sparkling 
down, and looked even more childlike than when he 
was alive. On the right side of the body a strange 
red design, resembling a bird, had been formed on the 
snow; but on the left the snow was untouched, and had 
remained smooth and dazzingly bright. The head had 
fallen forward in an attitude of submission, with the 
chin pressed against the chest, and crushing the thick 
curly beard; and amidst the red streams of congealed 
blood on the breast there lay a large brass cross. The 
noise they were all making seemed to set my head spin- 
ning. Petrovna never left off shrieking, the police- 



MY CHILDHOOD 229 

man shouted orders to Valei as he sent him on an errand, 
and grandfather cried: 

"Take care not to tread in his footprints !" 

But he suddenly knit his brows, and looking on the 
ground said in a loud, imperious tone to the police- 
man: "There is nothing for you to kick up a row about, 
Constable! This is God's affair ... a judgment 
from God . . . yet you must be fussing about some 
nonsense or other — bah!" 

And at once a hush fell on them all; they stood 
still and, taking in a long breath, crossed themselves. 
Several people now came hastily into the garden from 
the yard. They climbed over Petrovna's fence and 
some of them fell down, and uttered exclamations of 
pain ; but for all that they were quite quiet until grand- 
father cried in a voice of despair: 

"Neighbors! why are you spoiling my raspberry 
bushes'? Have you no consciences'?" 

Grandmother, sobbing violently, took my hand and 
brought me into the house. 

"What did he do?" I asked. 

"Couldn't you see*?" she answered. 

For the rest of the evening, until far into the night, 
strangers tramped in and out of the kitchen and the 
other rooms talking loudly; the police were in com- 
mand, and a man who looked like a deacon was mak- 
ing notes, and quacking like a duck: 



230 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Wha— at? Wha— at?' 

Grandmother offered them all tea in the kitchen, 
where, sitting at the table, was a rotund, whiskered in- 
dividual, marked with smallpox, who was saying in 
a shrill voice : 

"His real name we don't know ... all that we 
can find out is that his birthplace was Elatma. As 
for the Deaf Mute . . . that is only a nickname . . . 
he was not deaf and dumb at all . . . he knew all 
about the business. . . . And there 's a third man in 
it too . . . we J ve got to find him yet. They have 
been robbing churches for a long time; that was their 
lay." 

"Good Lord!" ejaculated Petrovna, very red, and 
perspiring profusely. 

As for me, I lay on the ledge of the stove and looked 
down on them, and thought how short and fat and 
dreadful they all were. 



CHAPTER X 

EARLY one Saturday morning I made my way to 
Petrovna's kitchen-garden to catch robins. I 
was there a long time, because the pert red-breasts re- 
fused to go into the trap ; tantalizingly beautiful, they 
hopped playfully over the silvery frozen snow, and 
flew on to the branches of the frost-covered bushes, 
scattering the blue snow-crystals all about. It was 
such a pretty sight that I forgot my vexation at my 
lack of success; in fact, I was not a very keen sports- 
man, for I took more pleasure in the incidents of the 
chase than in its results, and my greatest delight was 
to observe the ways of the birds and think about them. 
I was quite happy sitting alone on the edge of a snowy 
field listening to the birds chirping in the crystal still- 
ness of the frosty day, when, faintly, in the distance, I 
heard the fleeting sounds of the bells of a troika — like 
the melancholy song of a skylark in the Russian winter. 

I was benumbed by sitting in the snow, and I felt 
that my ears were frost-bitten, so I gathered up the 
trap and the cages, climbed over the wall into grand- 
father's garden, and made my way to the house. 

The gate leading to the street was open, and a man 

231 



232 MY CHILDHOOD 

of colossal proportions was leading three steaming 
horses, harnessed to a large, closed sledge, out of the 
yard, whistling merrily the while. My heart leaped. 

"Whom have you brought here*?" 

He turned and looked at me from under his arms, 
and jumped on to the driver's seat before he replied: 

"The priest." 

But I was not convinced ; and if it was the priest, he 
must have come to see one of the lodgers. 

"Gee-up!" cried the driver, and he whistled gaily as 
he slashed at the horses with his reins. 

The horses tore across the fields, and I stood look- 
ing after them; then I closed the gate. The first thing 
I heard as I entered the empty kitchen was my mother's 
energetic voice in the adjoining room, saying very dis- 
tinctly : 

"What is the matter now? Do you want to kill 
me?" 

Without taking off my outdoor clothes, I threw 
down the cages and ran into the vestibule, where I 
collided with grandfather; he seized me by the shoul- 
der, looked into my face with wild eyes, and swal- 
lowing with difficulty, said hoarsely: 

"Your mother has come back . . . go to her . . . 
wait . . . !" He shook me so hard that I was nearly 
taken off my feet, and reeled against the door of the 
room, "Goon! . . . Go . . . !" 



MY CHILDHOOD 233 

I knocked at the door, which was protected by felt 
and oilcloth, but it was some time before my hand, 
benumbed with cold, and trembling with nervousness, 
found the latch; and when at length I softly entered, 
I halted on the threshold, dazed and bewildered. 

"Here he is!" said mother. "Lord! how big he 
is grown. Why, don't you know me? . . . What a 
way you 've dressed him ! . . . And, yes, his ears are 
going white! Make haste, Mama, and get some 
goose-grease." 

She stood in the middle of the room, bending over 
me as she took off my outdoor clothes, and turning 
me about as if I were nothing more than a ball; her 
massive figure was clothed in a warm, soft, beautiful 
dress, as full as a man's cloak, which was fastened by 
black buttons, running obliquely from the shoulder to 
the hem of the skirt. I had never seen anything like 
it before. 

Her face seemed smaller than it used to be, and 
her eyes larger and more sunken; while her hair 
seemed to be of a deeper gold. As she undressed me, 
she threw the garments across the threshold, her red 
lips curling in disgust, and all the time her voice rang 
out: 

"Why don't you speak? Are n't you glad to see 
me? Phoo! what a dirty shirt. . . ." 

Then she rubbed my ears with goose-grease, which 



234 MY CHILDHOOD 

hurt; but such a fragrant, pleasant odor came from her 
while she was doing it, that the pain seemed less than 
usual. 

I pressed close to her, looking up into her eyes, 
too moved to speak, and through her words I could 
hear grandmother's low, unhappy voice : 

"He is so self-willed ... he has got quite out of 
hand. He is not afraid of grandfather, even. . . . 
Oh, Varia! . . . Varia!" 

"Don't whine, Mother, for goodness' sake; it does n't 
make things any better." 

Everything looked small and pitiful and old beside 
mother. I felt old too, as old as grandfather. 

Pressing me to her knees, and smoothing my hair 
with her warm, heavy hand, she said : 

"He wants some one strict over him. And it is time 
he went to school. . . . You will like to learn lessons, 
won't you?" 

"I 've learned all I want to know." 

"You will have to learn a little more. . . . Why! 
How strong you 've grown !" And she laughed heart- 
ily in her deep contralto tones as she played with me. 

When grandfather came in, pale as ashes, with blood- 
shot eyes, and bristling with rage, she put me from her 
and asked in a loud voice: 

"Well, what have you settled, Father? Am I to 
go?" 



MY CHILDHOOD 235 

He stood at the window scraping the ice off the 
panes with his finger-nails, and remained silent for a 
long while. The situation was strained and painful, 
and, as was usual with me in such moments of tension, 
my body felt as if it were all eyes and ears, and some- 
thing seemed to swell within my breast, causing an in- 
tense desire to scream. 

"Lexei, leave the room!" said grandfather roughly. 

"Why'?" asked mother, drawing me to her again. 
"You shall not go away from this place. I forbid 
it!" Mother stood up, gliding up the room, just like 
a rosy cloud, and placed herself behind grandfather. 

"Listen to me, Papasha — " 

He turned upon her, shrieking "Shut up!" 

"I won't have you shouting at me," said mother 
coolly. 

Grandmother rose from the couch, raising her finger 
admonishingly. 

"Now, Varvara!" 

And grandfather sat down, muttering: 

"Wait a bit! I want to know who — ? Eh*? Who 
was it 4 ? . . . How did it happen*?" 

And suddenly he roared out in a voice which did 
not seem to belong to him: 

"You have brought shame upon me, Varka!" 

"Go out of the room!" grandmother said to me; 
and I went into the kitchen, feeling as if I were being 



236 MY CHILDHOOD 

suffocated, climbed on to the stove, and stayed there a 
long time listening to their conversation, which was 
audible through the partition. They either all talked 
at once, interrupting one another, or else fell into a long 
silence as if they had fallen asleep. The subject of 
their conversation was a baby, lately born to my mother 
and given into some one's keeping; but I could not 
understand whether grandfather was angry with 
mother for giving birth to a child without asking his 
permission, or for not bringing the child to him. 

He came into the kitchen later, looking dishevelled; 
his face was livid, and he seemed very tired. With 
him came grandmother, wiping the tears from her 
cheeks with the basque of her blouse. He sat down on 
a bench, doubled up, resting his hands on it, tremu- 
lously biting his pale lips; and she knelt down in front 
of him, and said quietly but with great earnest- 
ness: 

"Father, forgive her ! For Christ's sake forgive her ! 
You can't get rid of her in this manner. Do you think 
that such things don't happen amongst the gentry, and 
in merchants' families'? You know what women are. 
Now, forgive her ! No one is perfect, you know." 

Grandfather leaned back against the wall and 
looked into her face; then he growled, with a bitter 
lau^h which was almost a sob: 

"Well — what next? Who wouldn't you forgive? 



MY CHILDHOOD 237 

I wonder! If you had your way every one would be 
forgiven. . . . Ugh! You!" 

And bending over her he seized her by the shoulders 
and shook her, and said, speaking in a rapid whisper: 

"But, by God, you need n't worry yourself. You 
will find no forgiveness in me. Here we are — almost 
in our graves — overtaken by punishment in our last 
days . . . there is neither rest nor happiness for us 
. . . nor will there be. . . . And what is more . . . 
mark my words! ... we shall be beggars before 
we 're done — beggars !" 

Grandmother took his hand, and sitting beside him 
laughed gently as she said: 

"Oh, you poor thing! So you are afraid of being 
a beggar. Well, and suppose we do become beggars? 
All you will have to do is to stay at home while I go 
out begging. . . . They '11 give to me, never fear ! 
. . . We shall have plenty; so you can throw that 
trouble aside." 

He suddenly burst out laughing, moving his head 
about just like a goat; and seizing grandmother round 
the neck, pressed her to him, looking small and 
crumpled beside her. 

"Oh, you fool !" he cried. "You blessed fool ! . . . 
You are all that I 've got now ! . . . You don't 
worry about anything because you don't understand. 
But you must look back a little . . . and remember 



238 MY CHILDHOOD 

how you and I worked for them . . . how I sinned 
for their sakes . . . yet, in spite of all that, now — " 

Here I could contain myself no longer; my tears 
would not be restrained, and I jumped down off the 
stove and flew to them, sobbing with joy because they 
were talking to each other in this wonderfully friendly 
fashion, and because I was sorry for them, and because 
mother had come, and because they took me to them, 
tears and all, and embraced me, and hugged me, and 
wept over me; but grandfather whispered to me: 

"So you are here, you little demon! Well, your 
mother 's come back, and I suppose you will always 
be with her now. The poor old devil of a grand- 
father can go, eh ? And grandmother, who has spoiled 
you so . . . she can go to ... eh? Ugh — 
you I . . ." 

He put us away from him and stood up as he said 
in a loud, angry tone : 

"They are all leaving us — all turning away from us. 
. . . Well, call her in. What are you waiting for? 
Make haste !" 

Grandmother went out of the kitchen, and he went 
and stood in the corner, with bowed head. 

"All-merciful God!" he began. "Well . . . Thou 
seest how it is with us!" And he beat his breast with 
his fist. 

I did not like it when he did this; in fact the way 



MY CHILDHOOD 239 

he spoke to God always disgusted me, because he 
seemed to be vaunting himself before his Maker. 

When mother came in her red dress lighted up the 
kitchen, and as she sat down by the table, with grand- 
father and grandmother one on each side of her, her 
wide sleeves fell against their shoulders. She related 
something to them quietly and gravely, to which they 
listened in silence, and without attempting to interrupt 
her, just as if they were children and she were their 
mother. 

Worn out by excitement, I fell fast asleep on the 
couch. 

In the evening the old people went to vespers, 
dressed in their best. Grandmother gave a merry 
wink in the direction of grandfather, who was resplend- 
ent in the uniform he wore as head of the Guild, 
with a racoon pelisse over it, and his stomach stick- 
ing out importantly; and as she winked she observed 
to mother : 

"Just look at father! Isn't he grand. ... As 
spruce as a little goat." And mother laughed gaily. 

When I was left alone with her in her room, she 
sat on the couch, with her feet curled under her, and 
pointing to the place beside her, she said : 

"Come and sit here. Now, tell me — how do you 
like living here? Not much, eh?" 

How did I like it? 



240 MY CHILDHOOD 

"I don't know." 

"Grandfather beats you, does he?" 

"Not so much now." 

"Oh? . . . Well, now, you tell me all about it . . . 
tell me whatever you like . . . well?" 

As I did not want to speak about grandfather, I told 
her about the kind man who used to live in that room, 
whom no one liked, and who was turned out by grand- 
father. I could see that she did not like this story as 
she said: 

"Well, and what else?" 

I told her about the three boys, and how the Colo- 
nel had driven me out of his yard; and her hold upon 
me tightened as she listened. 

"What nonsense !" she exclaimed with flashing eyes, 
and was silent a minute, gazing on the floor. 

"Why was grandfather angry with you?" I asked. 

"Because I have done wrong, according to him." 

"In not bringing that baby here — ?" 

She started violently, frowning, and biting her lips; 
then she burst into a laugh and pressed me more closely 
to her, as she said : 

"Oh, you little monster ! Now, you are to hold your 
tongue about that, do you hear? Never speak about 
it — forget you ever heard it, in fact." 

And she spoke to me quietly and sternly for some 
time; but I did not understand what she said, and 



MY CHILDHOOD 241 

presently she stood up and began to pace the room, 
strumming on her chin with her fingers, and alternately 
raising and depressing her thick eyebrows. 

A guttering tallow candle was burning on the table, 
and was reflected in the blank face of the mirror; 
murky shadows crept along the floor; a lamp burned 
before the icon in the corner; and the ice-clad windows 
were silvered by moonlight. Mother looked about her 
as if she were seeking something on the bare walls or 
on the ceiling. 

"What time do you go to bed?" 

"Let me stay a little longer." 

"Besides, you have had some sleep to-day," she re- 
minded herself. 

"Do you want to go away?" I asked her. 

"Where to?" she exclaimed, in a surprised tone; 
and raising my head she gazed for such a long time 
at my face that tears came into my eyes. 

"What is the matter with you?" she asked. 

"My neck aches." 

My heart was aching too, for I had suddenly realized 
that she would not remain in our house, but would go 
away again. 

"You are getting like your father," she observed, 
kicking a mat aside. "Has grandmother told you any- 
thing about him?" 

"Yes." 



242 MY CHILDHOOD 

"She loved Maxim very much — very much indeed; 
and he loved her — " 

"I know." 

Mother looked at the candle and frowned; then 
she extinguished it, saying: 'That 's better!" 

Yes, it made the atmosphere fresher and clearer, and 
the dark, murky shadows disappeared; bright blue 
patches of light lay on the floor, and golden crystals 
shone on the window-panes. 

"But where have you lived all this time?" 

She mentioned several towns, as if she were trying 
to remember something which she had forgotten long 
ago; and all the time she moved noiselessly round the 
room, like a hawk. 

"Where did you get that dress?" 

"I made it myself. I make all my own clothes." 

I liked to think that she was different from others, 
but I was sorry that she so rarely spoke; in fact, un- 
less I asked questions, she did not open her mouth. 

Presently she came and sat beside me again on the 
couch; and there we stayed without speaking, pressing 
close to each other, until the old people returned, smell- 
ing of wax and incense, with a solemn quietness and 
gentleness in their manner. 

We supped as on holidays, ceremoniously, exchang- 
ing very few words, and uttering those as if we were 
afraid of waking an extremely light sleeper. 



MY CHILDHOOD 243 

Almost at once my mother energetically under- 
took the task of giving me Russian lessons. She 
bought some books, from one of which — "Kindred 
Words" — I acquired the art of reading Russian char- 
acters in a few days; but then my mother must 
set me to learn poetry by heart — to our mutual vex- 
ation. 

The verses ran : 

"Bolshaia doroga, priamaia doroga 
Prostora ne malo beresh twi ou Boga 
Tebia ne rovniali topor ee lopata 
Miagka twi kopitou ee pwiliu bogata." 

But I read "prostovo" for "prostora," and "roubili" 
for "rovniali," and "kopita" for "kopitou." 

"Now, think a moment," said mother. "How 
could it be 'prostovo,' you little wretch? . . . 'Pro — 
sto — ra'-; now do you understand?" 

I did understand, but all the same I read "pros- 
tovo," to my own astonishment as much as hers. 

She said angrily that I was senseless and obstinate. 
This made bitter hearing, for I was honestly trying to 
remember the cursed verses, and I could repeat them 
in my own mind without a mistake, but directly I tried 
to say them aloud they went wrong. I loathed the 
elusive lines, and began to mix the verses up on pur- 
pose, putting all the words which sounded alike to- 
gether anyhow. I was delighted when, under the spell 



244 MY CHILDHOOD 

I placed upon them, the verses emerged absolutely 
meaningless. 

But this amusement did not go for long unpunished. 
One day, after a very successful lesson, when mother 
asked me if I had learned my poetry, I gabbled almost 
involuntarily : 

"Doroga, dvouroga, tvorog, nedoroga, 
Kopwita, popwito, korwito — " 

I recollected myself too late. Mother rose to her 
feet, and resting her hands on the table, asked in very 
distinct tones: 

"What is that you are saying*?" 

"I don't know," I replied dully. 

"Oh, you know well enough!" 

"It was just something — " 

"Something what 4 ?" 

"Something funny." 

"Go into the corner." 

"Why?" 

"Go into the corner," she repeated quietly, but her 
aspect was threatening. 

"Which corner?" 

Without replying, she gazed so fixedly at my face 
that I began to feel quite flustered, for I did not under- 
stand what she wanted me to do. In one corner, under 
the icon, stood a small table on which was a vase con- 



MY CHILDHOOD 245 

taining scented dried grass and some flowers; in an- 
other stood a covered trunk. The bed occupied the 
third, and there was no fourth, because the door came 
close up to the wall. 

"I don't know what you mean," I said, despairing 
of being able to understand her. 

She relaxed slightly, and wiped her forehead and 
her cheeks in silence ; then she asked : 

"Did n't grandfather put you in the corner 4 ?" 

"When?" 

"Never mind when! Has he ever done so?" she 
cried, striking the table twice with her hand. 

"No — at least I don't remember it." 

She sighed. "Phew! Come here!" 

I went to her, saying: "Why are you so angry with 
me?" 

"Because you made a muddle of that poetry on pur- 
pose." 

I explained as well as I was able that I could re- 
member it word for word with my eyes shut, but that 
if I tried to say it the words seemed to change. 

"Are you sure you are not making that up?" 

I answered that I was quite sure; but on second 
thoughts I was not so sure, and I suddenly repeated 
the verses quite correctly, to my own utter astonishment 
and confusion. I stood before my mother burning 
with shame; my face seemed to be swelling, my tingling 



246 MY CHILDHOOD 

ears to be filled with blood, and unpleasant noises 
surged through my head. I saw her face through my 
tears, dark with vexation, as she bit her lips and 
frowned. 

"What is the meaning of this?" she asked in a voice 
which did not seem to belong to her. "So you did 
make it up?" 

"I don't know. I didn't mean to!" 

"You are very difficult," she said, letting her head 
droop. "Run away!" 

She began to insist on my learning still more poetry, 
but my memory seemed to grow less capable every day 
of retaining the smooth, flowing lines, while my insane 
desire to alter or mutilate the verses grew stronger and 
more malevolent in proportion. I even substituted 
different words, by which I somewhat surprised myself, 
for a whole series of words which had nothing to do 
with the subject would appear and get mixed up with 
the correct words out of the book. Very often a whole 
line of the verse would seem to be obliterated, and no 
matter how conscientiously I tried, I could not get it 
back into my mind's eye. That pathetic poem of 
Prince Biazemskov (I think it was his) caused me a 
great deal of trouble: 

At eventide and early morn 

The old man, widow and orphan 

For Christ's sake ask for help from man. 



MY CHILDHOOD 247 

But the last line: 

At windows beg, with air forlorn. 

I always rendered correctly. Mother, unable to make 
anything of me, recounted my exploits to grandfather, 
who said in an ominous tone: 

"It is all put on ! He has a splendid memory. He 
learned the prayers by heart with me. . . . He is mak- 
ing believe, that 's all. His memory is good enough. 
. . . Teaching him is like engraving on a piece of 
stone . . . that will show you how good it is! . . . 
You should give him a hiding." 

Grandmother took me to task too. 

"You can remember stories and songs . . . and 
aren't songs poetry?" 

All this was true and I felt very guilty, but all the 
same I no sooner set myself to learn verses than from 
somewhere or other different words crept in like cock- 
roaches, and formed themselves into lines. 

"We too have beggars at our door, 
Old men and orphans very poor. 
They come and whine and ask for food, 
Which they will sell, though it is good. 
To Petrovna to feed her cows 
And then on vodka will carouse." 

At night, when I lay in bed beside grandmother, 
I used to repeat to her, till I was weary, all that I had 



248 MY CHILDHOOD 

learned out of books, and all that I had composed 
myself. Sometimes she giggled, but more often she 
gave me a lecture. 

"There now! You see what you can do. But it 
is not right to make fun of beggars, God bless them! 
Christ lived in poverty, and so did all the saints." 

I murmured : 

"Paupers I hate, 
Grandfather too. 
It 's sad to relate, 
Pardon me, God ! 
Grandfather beats me 
Whenever he can." 

"What are you talking about*? I wish your tongue 
may drop out !" cried grandmother angrily. "If grand- 
father could hear what you are saying — " 

"He can hear if he likes." 

"You are very wrong to be so saucy; it only makes 
your mother angry, and she has troubles enough with- 
out you," said grandmother gravely and kindly. 

"What is the matter with her?" 

"Never mind! You wouldn't understand." 

"I know ! It is because grandfather — " 

"Hold your tongue, I tell you !" 

My lot was a hard one, for I was desperately trying 
to find a kindred spirit, but as I was anxious that no 
one should know of this, I took refuge in being saucy 



MY CHILDHOOD 249 

and disagreeable. The lessons with my mother became 
gradually more distasteful and more difficult to me. I 
easily mastered arithmetic, but I had not the patience 
to learn to write, and as for grammar, it was quite un- 
intelligible to me. 

But what weighed upon me most of all was the fact, 
which I both saw and felt, that it was very hard for 
mother to go on living in grandfather's house. Her 
expression became more sullen every day; she seemed 
to look upon everything with the eyes of a stranger. 
She used to sit for a long time together at the window 
overlooking the garden, saying nothing, and all her 
brilliant coloring seemed to have faded. 

In lesson-time her deep-set eyes seemed to look right 
through me, at the wall, or at the window, as she asked 
me questions in a weary voice, and straightway forgot 
the answers; and she flew into rages with me much 
oftener — which hurt me, for mothers ought to behave 
better than any one else, as they do in stories. 

Sometimes I said to her : 

"You do not like living with us, do you?" 

"Mind your own business!" she would cry angrily. 

It began to dawn upon me that grandfather was up 
to something which worried grandmother and mother. 
He often shut himself up with mother in her room, and 
there we heard him wailing and squeaking like the 
wooden pipe of Nikanora, the one-sided shepherd, 



250 MY CHILDHOOD 

which always affected me so unpleasantly. Once when 
one of these conversations was going on, mother 
shrieked so that every one in the house could hear her : 

"I won't have it! I won't!" 

And a door banged — and grandfather set up a howl. 

This happened in the evening. Grandmother was 
sitting at the kitchen table making a shirt for grand- 
father and whispering to herself. When the door 
banged, she said, listening intently: 

"O Lord ! she has gone up to the lodgers." 

At this moment grandfather burst into the kitchen, 
and rushing up to grandmother, gave her a blow on the 
head, and hissed as he shook his bruised fist at her: 

"Don't you go chattering about things there 's no 
need to talk about, you old hag!" 

"You are an old fool !" retorted grandmother quietly, 
as she put her knocked-about hair straight. "Do you 
think I am going to keep quiet 4 ? I '11 tell her every- 
thing I know about your plots always." 

He threw himself upon her and struck at her large 
head with his fists. 

Making no attempt to defend herself, or to strike 
him back, she said : 

"Go on! Beat me, you silly fool! . . . That's 
right! Hit me!" 

I threw cushions and blankets at him from the couch, 
and the boots which were round the stove, but he was 



MY CHILDHOOD 151 

in such a frenzy of rage that he did not heed them. 
Grandmother fell to the floor and he kicked her head, 
till he finally stumbled and fell down himself, over- 
turning a pailful of water. He jumped up spluttering 
and snorting, glanced wildly round, and rushed away 
to his own room in the attic. 

Grandmother rose with a sigh, sat down on the 
bench, and began to straighten her matted hair. I 
jumped off the couch, and she said to me in an angry 
tone: 

"Put these pillows and things in their places. The 
idea ! Fancy throwing pillows at any one ! . . . And 
was it any business of yours? As for that old devil, 
he has gone out of his mind — the fool !" 

Then she drew in her breath sharply, wrinkling up 
her face as she called me to her, and holding her head 
down said: 

"Look! What is it that hurts me so?' 

I put her heavy hair aside, and saw that a hairpin 
had been driven deep into the skin of her head. I 
pulled it out; but finding another one, my fingers 
seemed to lose all power of movement and I said: 
"I think I had better call mother. I am fright- 
ened." 

She waved me aside. 

"What is the matter? . . . Call mother indeed! 
I '11 call you ! . . . Thank God that she has heard and 



252 MY CHILDHOOD 

seen nothing of it ! As for you — Now then, get out 
of my way!" 

And with her own flexible lace-worker's fingers she 
rummaged in her thick mane, while I plucked up suffi- 
cient courage to help her pull out two more thick, bent 
hairpins. 

"Does it hurt you?' 

"Not much. I '11 heat the bath to-morrow and wash 
my head. It will be all right then." 

Then she began persuasively: "Now, my darling, 
you won't tell your mother that he beat me, will you? 
There is enough bad feeling between them without 
that. So you won't tell, will you?" 

"No." 

"Now, don't you forget! Come, let us put things 
straight. . . . There are no bruises on my face, are 
there ? So that 's all right ; we shall be able to keep 
it quiet." 

Then she set to work to clean the floor, and I ex- 
claimed, from the bottom of my heart : 

"You are just like a saint . . . they torture you, 
and torture you, and you think nothing of it." 

"What is that nonsense you are jabbering? 
Saint — ? Where did you ever see one?" 

And going on all fours, she kept muttering to herself, 
while I sat by the side of the stove and thought on 
ways and means of being revenged on grandfather. It 



MY CHILDHOOD 253 

was the first time in my presence that he had beaten 
grandmother in such a disgusting and terrible manner. 
His red face and his dishevelled red hair rose before 
me in the twilight; my heart was boiling over with 
rage, and I was irritated because I could not think of an 
adequate punishment. 

But a day or two after this, having been sent up to 
his attic with something for him, I saw him sitting 
on the floor before an open trunk, looking through 
some papers; while on a chair lay his favorite calen- 
dar — consisting of twelve leaves of thick, gray paper, 
divided into squares according to the number of days 
in the month, and in each square was the figure of the 
saint of the day. Grandfather greatly valued this 
calendar, and only let me look at it on those rare oc- 
casions when he was very pleased with me; and I was 
conscious of an indefinable feeling as I gazed at the 
charming little gray figures placed so close together. 
I knew the lives of some of them too — Kirik and Uliti, 
Barbara, the great martyr, Panteleimon, and many 
others; but what I liked most was the sad life of Alexei, 
the man of God, and the beautiful verses about him. 
Grandmother often repeated them to me feelingly. 
One might consider hundreds of such people and con- 
sole oneself with the thought that they were all martyrs. 

But now I made up my mind to tear up the calendar ; 
and when grandfather took a dark blue paper to the 



254 MY CHILDHOOD 

window to read it, I snatched up several leaves, and 
flying downstairs stole the scissors off grandmother's 
table, and throwing myself on the couch began to cut 
off the heads of the saints. 

When I had beheaded one row I began to feel that 
it was a pity to destroy the calendar, so I decided to 
just cut out the squares; but before the second row 
was in pieces grandfather appeared in the doorway 
and asked: 

"Who gave you permission to take away my 
calendar?" 

Then seeing the squares of paper scattered over the 
table he picked them up, one after the other, holding 
each close to his face, then dropping it and picking up 
another; his jaw went awry, his beard jumped up and 
down, and he breathed so hard that the papers flew 
on to the floor. 

"What have you done?" he shrieked at length, drag- 
ging me towards him by the foot. 

I turned head over heels, and grandmother caught 
me, with grandfather striking her with his fist and 
screaming : 

"I'll kill him!" 

At this moment mother appeared, and I took refuge 
in the corner of the stove, while she, barring his way, 
caught grandfather's hands, which were being flour- 
ished in her face, and pushed him away as she said : 



MY CHILDHOOD 255 

"What is the meaning of this unseemly behavior? 
Recollect yourself." 

Grandfather threw himself on the bench under the 
window, howling: 

"You want to kill me. You are all against me — 
every one of you!" 

"Are n't you ashamed of yourself?" My mother's 
voice sounded subdued. "Why all this pretense?" 

Grandfather shrieked, and kicked the bench, with his 
beard sticking out funnily towards the ceiling and his 
eyes tightly closed; it seemed to me that he really was 
ashamed before mother, and that he was really pre- 
tending — and that was why he kept his eyes shut. 

"I '11 gum all these pieces together on some calico, 
and they will look even better than before," said 
mother, glancing at the cuttings and the leaves. 
"Look — they were crumpled and torn; they had been 
lying about." 

She spoke to him just like she used to speak to me 
in lesson-time when I could not understand something, 
and he stood up at once, put his shirt and waistcoat 
straight, in a business-like manner, expectorated and 
said: 

"Do it to-day. I will bring you the other leaves at 
once." 

He went to the door, but he halted on the threshold 
and pointed a crooked finger at me: 



256 MY CHILDHOOD 

"And he will have to be whipped." 

"That goes without saying," agreed mother, bend- 
ing towards me. "Why did you do it 4 ?" 

"I did it on purpose. He had better not beat grand- 
mother again, or I '11 cut his beard off." 

Grandmother, taking off her torn bodice, said, shak- 
ing her head reproachfully : 

"Hold your tongue now, as you promised." And 
she spat on the floor. "May your tongue swell up if 
you don't keep it still !" 

Mother looked at her, and again crossed the kitchen 
to me. 

"When did he beat her?" 

"Now, Varvara, you ought to be ashamed to ask 
him about it. Is it any business of yours?" said grand- 
mother angrily. 

Mother went and put her arm round her. "Oh, lit- 
tle mother — my dear little mother!" 

"Oh, go away with your 'little mother' ! Get 
away !" 

They looked at each other in silence. Grandfather 
could be heard stamping about in the vestibule. 

When she first came home mother had made friends 
with the merry lady, the soldier's wife, and almost 
every evening she went up to the front room of the 
half-house, where she sometimes found people from 



MY CHILDHOOD 257 

Betlenga House — beautiful ladies, and officers. 
Grandfather did not like this at all, and one day, as 
he was sitting in the kitchen, he shook his spoon at her 
threateningly and muttered: 

"So you are starting your old ways, curse you ! We 
don't get a chance of sleeping till the morning now." 

He soon cleared the lodgers out, and when they 
had gone he brought from somewhere or other two 
loads of assorted furniture, placed it in the front room, 
and locked it up with a large padlock. 

"We have no need to take lodgers," he said. "I am 
going to entertain on my own account now." 

And so on Sundays and holidays visitors began to 
appear. There was grandmother's sister, Matrena 
Sergievna, a shrewish laundress with a large nose, in a 
striped silk dress and with hair dyed gold; and with 
her came her sons — Vassili, a long-haired draughtsman, 
good-natured and gay, who was dressed entirely in 
gray; and Victor, in all colors of the rainbow, with a 
head like a horse, and a narrow face covered with 
freckles, who, even while he was in the vestibule taking 
off his goloshes, sang in a squeaky voice just like Pe- 
trushka's: "Andrei-papa! Andrei-papa!" which oc- 
casioned me some surprise and alarm. 

Uncle Jaakov used to come too, with his guitar, 
and accompanied by a bent, bald-headed man — a 
clock-winder, who wore a long, black frock-coat and 



258 MY CHILDHOOD 

had a smooth manner; he reminded me of a monk. 
He used to sit in a corner with his head on one side, 
and smiling curiously as he tapped his shaven, clefted 
chin with his fingers. He was dark, and there was 
something peculiar in the way he stared at us with 
his one eye ; he said very little, and his favorite expres- 
sion was: "Pray don't trouble; it doesn't matter in 
the least." 

When I saw him for the first time I suddenly re- 
membered one day long ago, while we were living in 
New Street, hearing the dull, insistent beating of a 
drum outside the gate, and seeing a night-cart, sur- 
rounded by soldiers and people in black, going from 
the prison to the square; and seated on a bench in the 
cart was a man of medium size, with a round cap made 
of woolen stuff, in chains — and upon his breast a black 
tablet was displayed, on which there were written some 
words in large white letters. The man hung his head 
as if he were reading what was written there, and he 
shook all over and his chains rattled. So when mother 
said to the winder: "This is my son," I shrank away 
from him in terror, and put my hands behind me. 

"Pray don't trouble!" he said, and his whole mouth 
seemed to stretch, in a ghastly fashion, as far as his 
right ear, as he seized me by the belt, drew me to him, 
turned me round swiftly and lightly, and let me go. 

"He 's all right. He 's a sturdy little chap." 



MY CHILDHOOD 259 

I betook myself to the corner, where there was an 
armchair upholstered in leather — so large that one 
could lie in it; and grandfather used to brag about it, 
and call it "Prince Gruzincki's armchair" — and in this 
I settled myself and looked on, thinking that grown-up 
people's ideas of enjoyment were very boring, and that 
the way the clock-winder's face kept on changing was 
very strange, and was not calculated to inspire confi- 
dence. 

It was an oily, flexible face, and it seemed to be melt- 
ing and always softly on the move; if he smiled, his 
thick lips shifted to his right cheek, and his little nose 
turned that way too, and looked like a meat pasty on a 
plate. His great projecting ears moved strangely too, 
one being lifted every time he raised his eyebrow over 
his seeing eye, and the other moving in unison with his 
cheek-bone; and when he sneezed it seemed as if it 
were as easy to cover his nose with them as with the 
palm of his hand. Sometimes he sighed, and thrust 
out his dark tongue, round as a pestle, and licked his 
thick, moist lips with a circular movement. This did 
not strike me as being funny, but only as something 
wonderful, which I could not help looking at. 

They drank tea with rum in it, which smelt like 
burnt onion tops; they drank liqueurs made by grand- 
mother, some yellow like gold, some black like tar, some 
green; they ate curds, and buns made of butter, eggs 



260 MY CHILDHOOD 

and honey; they perspired, and panted, and lavished 
praises on grandmother; and when they had finished 
eating, they settled themselves, looking flushed and 
puffy, decorously in their chairs, and languidly asked 
Uncle Jaakov to play. 

He bent over his guitar and struck up a disagree- 
able, irritating song: 

"Oh, we have been out on the spree, 
The town rang with our voices free, 
And to a lady from Kazan 
We 've told our story, every man." 

I thought this was a miserable song, and grand- 
mother said: 

"Why don't you play something else, Jaasha? — a 
real song! Do you remember, Matrena, the sort of 
songs we used to sing?" 

Spreading out her rustling frock, the laundress re- 
minded her: 

'There 's a new fashion in singing now, Matushka." 

Uncle looked at grandmother, blinking as if she 
were a long way off, and went on obstinately pro- 
ducing those melancholy sounds and foolish words. 

Grandfather was carrying on a mysterious conver- 
sation with the clock-winder, pointing his finger at him ; 
and the latter, raising his eyebrow, looked over to 
mother's side of the room and shook his head, and his 
mobile face assumed a new and indescribable shape. 



MY CHILDHOOD 261 

Mother always sat between the Sergievnas, and as 
she talked quietly and gravely to Vassili, she sighed : 

"Ye — es ! That w r ants thinking about." 

And Victor smiled the smile of one who has eaten to 
satiety, and scraped his feet on the floor; then he sud- 
denly burst shrilly into song: 

"Andrei-papa! Andrei-papa!" 

They all stopped talking in surprise and looked at 
him; while the laundress explained in a tone of 
pride : 

"He got that from the theater; they sing it there." 

There were two or three evenings like this, made 
memorable by their oppressive dullness, and then the 
winder appeared in the daytime, one Sunday after 
High Mass. I was sitting with mother in her room 
helping her to mend a piece of torn beaded embroidery, 
when the door flew open unexpectedly and grandmother 
rushed into the room with a frightened face, saying in 
a loud whisper: "Varia, he has come!" and disap- 
peared immediately. 

Mother did not stir, not an eyelash quivered; but 
the door was soon opened again, and there stood grand- 
father on the threshold. 

"Dress yourself, Varvara, and come along!" 

She sat still, and without looking at him said: 

"Come where V 

"Come along, for God's sake ! Don't begin arguing. 



262 MY CHILDHOOD 

He is a good, peaceable man, in a good position, and 
he will make a good father for Lexei." 

He spoke in an unusually important manner, strok- 
ing his sides with the palms of his hands the while; 
but his elbows trembled, as they were bent backwards, 
exactly as if his hands wanted to be stretched out in 
front of him, and he had a struggle to keep them back. 

Mother interrupted him calmly. 

"I tell you that it can't be done." 

Grandfather stepped up to her, stretching out his 
hands just as if he were blind, and bending over her, 
bristling with rage, he said, with a rattle in his throat : 

"Come along, or I '11 drag you to him — by the 
hair." 

"You'll drag me to him, will you?" asked mother, 
standing up. She turned pale and her eyes were pain- 
fully drawn together as she began rapidly to take off 
her bodice and skirt, and finally, wearing nothing but 
her chemise, went up to grandfather and said: 

"Now, drag me to him." 

He ground his teeth together and shook his fist in 
her face : 

"Varvara! Dress yourself at once!" 

Mother pushed him aside with her hand, and took 
hold of the door handle. 

"Well? Come along!" 

"Curse you !" whispered grandfather. 



MY CHILDHOOD 263 

"I am not afraid — come along!" 

She opened the door, but grandfather seized her by 
her chemise and fell on his knees, whispering : 

"Varvara ! You devil ! You will ruin us. Have 
you no shame 4 ?" 

And he wailed softly and plaintively: 

"Mo— ther! Mo— ther!" 

Grandmother was already barring mother's way; 
waving her hands in her face as if she were a hen, she 
now drove her away from the door, muttering through 
her closed teeth : 

"Varka! You fool! What are you doing? Go 
away, you shameless hussy!" 

She pushed her into the room and secured the door 
with the hook; and then she bent over grandfather, 
helping him up with one hand and threatening him 
with the other. 

"Ugh! You old devil!" 

She sat him on the couch, and he went down all of 
a heap, like a rag doll, with his mouth open and his 
head waggling. 

"Dress yourself at once, you!" cried grandmother 
to mother. 

Picking her dress up from the floor, mother said : 

"But I am not going to him — do you hear*?" 

Grandmother pushed me away from the couch. 

"Go and fetch a basin of water. Make haste!" 



264 MY CHILDHOOD 

She spoke in a low voice, which was almost a whis- 
per, and with a calm, assured manner. 

I ran into the vestibule. I could hear the heavy 
tread of measured footsteps in the front room of the 
half -house, and mother's voice came after me from 
her room: 

"I shall leave this place to-morrow!" 

I went into the kitchen and sat down by the window 
as if I were in a dream. 

Grandfather groaned and shrieked; grandmother 
muttered; then there was the sound of a door being 
banged, and all was silent — oppressively so. 

Remembering what I had been sent for, I scooped 
up some water in a brass basin and went into the ves- 
tibule. From the front room came the clock-winder 
with his head bent; he was smoothing his fur cap with 
his hand, and quacking. Grandmother with her hands 
folded over her stomach was bowing to his back, and 
saying softly: 

"You know what it is yourself — you can't be forced 
to be nice to people." 

He halted on the threshold, and then stepped into 
the yard; and grandmother, trembling all over, crossed 
herself and did not seem to know whether she wanted 
to laugh or cry. 

"What is the matter?" I asked, running to her. 



MY CHILDHOOD 265 

She snatched the basin from me, splashing the water 
over my legs, and cried : 

"So this is where you come for water. Bolt the 
door !" And she went back into mother's room ; and I 
went into the kitchen again and listened to them sigh- 
ing and groaning and muttering, just as if they were 
moving a load, which was too heavy for them, from one 
place to another. 

• •••••• 

It was a brilliant day. Through the ice-covered 
window-panes peeped the slanting beams of the winter 
sun; on the table, which was laid for dinner, was the 
pewter dinner-service; a goblet containing red kvass, 
and another with some dark-green vodka made by 
grandfather from betony and St. John's wort, gleamed 
dully. Through the thawed places on the window 
could be seen the snow on the roofs, dazzlingly bright 
and sparkling like silver on the posts of the fence. 
Hanging against the window-frame in cages, my birds 
played in the sunshine : the tame siskins chirped gaily, 
the robins uttered their sharp, shrill twitter, and the 
goldfinch took a bath. 

But this radiant, silver day, in which every sound 
was clear and distinct, brought no joy with it, for it 
seemed out of place — everything seemed out of place. 
I was seized with a desire to set the birds free, and 



266 MY CHILDHOOD 

was about to take down the cages when grandmother 
rushed in, clapping her hands to her sides, and flew 
to the stove, calling herself names. 

"Curse you! Bad luck to you for an old fool, 
Akulina!" 

She drew a pie out of the oven, touched the crust 
with her finger, and spat on the floor out of sheer ex- 
asperation. 

"There you are — absolutely dried up! It is your 
own fault that it is burnt. Uch ! Devil ! A plague 
upon all your doings ! Why don't you keep your eyes 
open, owl? . . . You are as unlucky as bad money!" 

And she cried, and blew on the pie, and turned it 
over, first on this side, then on that, tapping the dry 
crust with her fingers, upon which her large tears 
splashed forlornly. 

When grandfather and mother came into the kitchen 
she banged the pie on the table so hard that all the 
plates jumped. 

"Look at that ! That 's your doing . . . there 's no 
crust for you, top or bottom !" 

Mother, looking quite happy and peaceful, kissed 
her, and told her not to get angry about it; while grand- 
father, looking utterly crushed and weary, sat down to 
table and unfolded his serviette, blinking, with the 
sun in his eyes, and muttered : 

"That will do. It does n't matter. We have eaten 



MY CHILDHOOD 267 

plenty of pies that were not spoilt. When the Lord 
buys He pays for a year in minutes . . . and allows 
no interest. Sit down, do, Varia! . . . and have 
done with it." 

He behaved just as if he had gone out of his mind, 
and talked all dinner-time about God, and about un- 
godly Ahab, and said what a hard lot a father's was, 
until grandmother interrupted him by saying angrily: 

"You eat your dinner . . . that 's the best thing 
you can do!" 

Mother joked all the time, and her clear eyes 
sparkled. 

"So you were frightened just now?" she asked, giv- 
ing me a push. 

No, I had not been so frightened then, but now I 
felt uneasy and bewildered. As the meal dragged out 
to the weary length which was usual on Sundays and 
holidays, it seemed to me that these could not be the 
same people who, only half an hour ago, were shout- 
ing at each other, on the verge of fighting, and burst- 
ing out into tears and sobs. I could not believe, that is 
to say, that they were in earnest now, and that they 
were not ready to weep all the time. But those tears 
and cries, and the scenes which they inflicted upon one 
another, happened so often, and died away so quickly, 
that I began to get used to them, and they gradually 
ceased to excite me or to cause me heartache. 



268 MY CHILDHOOD 

Much later I realized that Russian people, because 
of the poverty and squalor of their lives, love to amuse 
themselves with sorrow — to play with it like children, 
and are seldom ashamed of being unhappy. 

Amidst their endless week-days, grief makes a holi- 
day, and a fire is an amusement — a scratch is an orna- 
ment to an empty face. 



CHAPTER XI 

AFTER this incident mother suddenly asserted her- 
self, made a firm stand, and was soon mistress 
of the house, while grandfather, grown thoughtful and 
quiet, and quite unlike himself, became a person of no 
account. 

He hardly ever went out of the house, but sat all 
day up in the attic reading, by stealth, a book called 
"The Writings of My Father." He kept this book in 
a trunk under lock and key, and one day I saw him 
wash his hands before he took it out. It was a dumpy, 
fat book bound in red leather; on the dark blue title 
page a figured inscription in different colored inks 
flaunted itself: "To worthy Vassili Kashmirin, in 
gratitude, and sincere remembrance"; and underneath 
were written some strange surnames, while the frontis- 
piece depicted a bird on the wing. 

Carefully opening the heavy binding, grandfather 

used to put on his silver-rimmed spectacles, and gazing 

at the book, move his nose up and down for a long time, 

in order to get his spectacles at the right angle. 

I asked him more than once what book it was that 

269 



270 MY CHILDHOOD 

he was reading, but he only answered in an impressive 
tone: 

"Never mind. . . . Wait a bit, and when I die it 
will come to you. I will leave you my racoon pelisse 
too." 

He began to speak to mother more gently, but less 
often; listening attentively to her speeches with his 
eyes glittering like Uncle Peter's, and waving her aside 
as he muttered: 

"There ! that 's enough. Do what you like . . ." 

In that trunk of his lay many wonderful articles of 
attire — skirts of silken material, padded satin jackets, 
sleeveless silk gowns, cloth of woven silver and head- 
bands sewn with pearls, brightly colored lengths of ma- 
terial and handkerchiefs, with necklaces of colored 
stones. He took them all, panting as he went, to 
mother's room and laid them about on the chairs and 
tables — clothes were mother's delight — and he said to 
her: 

"In our young days dress was more beautiful and 
much richer than it is now. Dress was richer, and 
people seemed to get on better together. But these 
times are past and cannot be called back . . . well, 
here you are; take them, and dress yourself up." 

One day mother went to her room for a short time, 
and when she reappeared she was dressed in a dark 



MY CHILDHOOD 271 

blue sleeveless robe, embroidered with gold, with a 
pearl head-band ; and making a low obeisance to grand- 
father, she asked: 

"Well, how does this suit you, my lord Father*?" 
Grandfather murmured something, and brightening 
wonderfully, walked round her, holding up his hands, 
and said indistinctly, just as if he were talking in his 
sleep : 

"Ech! Varvara! ... if you had plenty of money 
you would have the best people round you ... !" 

Mother lived now in two front rooms in the half- 
house, and had a great many visitors, the most frequent 
being the brothers Maximov: Peter, a well-set-up, 
handsome officer with a large, light beard and blue eyes 
— the very one before whom grandfather thrashed me 
for spitting on the old gentleman's head; and Eugen, 
also tall and thin, with a pale face and a small, pointed 
beard. His large eyes were like plums, and he was 
dressed in a green coat with gold buttons and gold let- 
ters on his narrow shoulders. He often tossed his head 
lightly, throwing his long, wavy hair back from his 
high, smooth forehead, and smiled indulgently; and 
whenever he told some story in his husky voice, he in- 
variably began his speech with these insinuating words : 
"Shall I tell you how it appears to me?' 
Mother used to listen to him with twinkling eyes, 



272 MY CHILDHOOD 

and frequently interrupted him laughingly with: 
"You are a baby, Eugen Vassilovitch — forgive me for 
saying so!" 

And the officer, slapping his broad palms on his 
knees, would cry: 

"A queer sort of baby !" 

The Christmas holidays were spent in noisy gaiety, 
and almost every evening people came to see mother 
in full dress ; or she put on gala dress — better than any 
of them wore — and went out with her guests. 

Every time she left the house, in company with her 
gaily attired guests, it seemed to sink into the earth, 
and a terrifying silence seemed to creep into every cor- 
ner of it. Grandmother flapped about the room like 
an old goose, putting everything straight. Grand- 
father stood with his back against the warm tiles of the 
stove, and talked to himself. 

"Well . . . that will do . . . very good! . . . 
We '11 have a look and see what family . . ." 

After the Christmas holidays mother sent Sascha, 
Uncle Michael's son, and me to school. Sascha's 
father had married again, and from the very first the 
stepmother had taken a dislike to her stepson, and 
had begun to beat him; so at grandmother's entreaty, 
grandfather had taken Sascha to live in his house. 
We went to school for a month, and all I learned, as 
far as I remember, was that when I was asked "What 



MY CHILDHOOD 273 

is your surname?" I must not reply "Pyeshkov" simply, 
but "My surname is Pyeshkov." And also that I must 
not say to the teacher: "Don't shout at me, my dear 
fellow, I am not afraid of you !" 

At first I did not like school, but my cousin was 
very pleased with it in the beginning, and easily made 
friends for himself; but once he fell asleep during a 
lesson, and suddenly called out in his sleep : 

a Iwo-on't!" 

He awoke with a start and ran out of the class-room 
without ceremony. He was mercilessly laughed at for 
this; and the next day, when we were in the passage 
by Cyenvi Square, on our way to school, he came to a 
halt saying: 

"You go on ... I am not coming ... I would 
rather go for a walk." 

He squatted on his heels, carelessly dug his bundle 
of books into the snow, and went off. It was a clear 
January day, and the silver rays of the sun fell all 
round me. I envied my cousin very much, but, harden- 
ing my heart, I went on to school. I did not want to 
grieve my mother. The books which Sascha buried 
disappeared, of course, so he had a valid reason for not 
going to school the next day; but on the third day his 
conduct was brought to grandfather's notice. We 
were called up for judgment; in the kitchen grand- 
father, grandmother, and mother sat at the table and 



274 MY CHILDHOOD 

cross-examined us — and I shall never forget how comi- 
cally Sascha answered grandfather's questions. 

"Why did n't you go to school?" 

"I forgot where it was." 

"Forgot?" 

"Yes. I looked and looked—" 

"But you went with Alexei; he remembered where 
it was." 

"And I lost him." 

"Lost Lexei?" 

"Yes." 

"How did that happen?" 

Sascha reflected a moment, and then said, drawing 
in his breath: 

"There was a snowstorm, and you could n't see any- 
thing." 

They all smiled — and the atmosphere began to clear ; 
even Sascha smiled cautiously. But grandfather said 
maliciously, showing his teeth: 

"But you could have caught hold of his arm or his 
belt, couldn't you?" 

"I did catch hold of them, but the wind tore them 
away," explained Sascha. 

He spoke in a lazy, despondent tone, and I listened 
uncomfortably to this unnecessary, clumsy lie, amazed 
at his obstinacy. 

We were thrashed, and a former fireman, an old man 



MY CHILDHOOD 275 

with a broken arm, was engaged to take us to school, 
and to watch that Sascha did not turn aside from the 
road of learning. But it was no use. The next day, 
as soon as my cousin reached the causeway, he stooped 
suddenly, and pulling off one of his high boots threw it 
a long way from him; then he took off the other and 
threw it in the opposite direction, and in his stockinged 
feet ran across the square. The old man, breathing 
hard, picked up the boots, and thereupon, terribly 
flustered, took me home. 

All that day grandfather, grandmother, and my 
mother searched the town for the runaway, and it was 
evening before they found him in the bar at Tchirkov's 
Tavern, entertaining the public by his dancing. They 
took him home, and actually did not beat the shaking, 
stubborn, silent lad; but as he lay beside me in the 
loft, with his legs up and the soles of his feet scraping 
against the ceiling, he said softly: 

"My stepmother does not love me, nor my father. 
Grandfather does not love me either; why should I 
live with them*? So I shall ask grandmother to tell 
me where the robbers live, and I shall run away to 
them . . . then you will understand, all of you. . . . 
Why should n't we run away together ?" 

I could not run away with him, for in those days I 
had a work before me — I had resolved to be an officer 
with a large, light beard, and for that study was indis- 



276 MY CHILDHOOD 

pensable. When I told my cousin of my plan, he 
agreed with me, on reflection. 

"That 's a good idea too. By the time you are an 
officer I shall be a robber-chief, and you will have to 
capture me, and one of us will have to kill the other, 
or take him prisoner. I shan't kill you." 

"Nor I you." 

On that point we were agreed. 

Then grandmother came in, and climbing on to the 
stove, glanced up at us and said : 

"Well, little mice? E — ekh! Poor orphans! . . . 
Poor little mites !" 

Having pitied us, she began to abuse Sascha's step- 
mother — fat Aunt Nadejda, daughter of the inn-keeper, 
going on to abuse stepmothers in general, and, apropos, 
told us the story of the wise hermit Iona, and how 
when he was but a lad he was judged, with his step- 
mother, by an act of God. His father was a fisherman 
of the White Lake : 

"By his young wife his ruin was wrought, 
A potent liquor to him she brought, 

Made of herbs which bring sleep. 
She laid him, slumbering, in a bark 
Of oak, like a grave, so close and dark, 

And plied the maple oars. 
In the lake's center she dug a hole, 
For there she had planned, in that dark pool, 

To hide her vile witch deed. 



MY CHILDHOOD 277 

Bent double she rocked from side to side, 

And the frail craft o'erturned — that witch bride ! 

And her husband sank deep. 
And the witch swam quickly to the shore 
And fell to the earth with wailings sore, 

And womanly laments. 
The good folk all, believing her tale, 
Wept with the disconsolate female, 

And in bitterness cried: 
'Oi ! As wife thy life was all too brief ! 
O'erwhelmed art thou by wifely grief; 

But life is God's affair. 
Death too He sends when it doth please Him/ 
Stepson Ionushka alone looked grim, 

Her tears not believing. 
With his little hand upon his heart 
He swiftly at her these words did dart: 

'Oi! Fateful stepmother! 
Oi ! Artful night-bird, born to deceive ! 
Those tears of yours I do not believe ! 

It is joy you feel not pain. 
But we '11 ask our Lord, my charge to prove, 
And the aid of all the saints above. 

Let some one take a knife, 
And throw it up to the cloudless sky; 
Blameless you, to me the knife will fly. 

If I am right, you die!' 

...... * 

The stepmother turned her baleful gaze 
On him, and with hate her eyes did blaze 

As she rose to her feet. 
And with vigor replied to the attack 
Of her stepson, nor words did she lack. 

'Oh ! creature without sense ! 



278 MY CHILDHOOD 

Abortion you ! — fit for rubbish heap ! 
By this invention, what do you reap % 

Answer you cannot give !' 
The good folk looked on, but nothing said; 
Of this dark business they were afraid. 

Sad and pensive they stood; 
Then amongst themselves they held a debate, 
And a fisherman old and sedate 

Bowing, advanced and said: 
'In my right hand, good people, give me 
A steel knife, which I will throw, and ye 

Shall see on whom it falls.' 
A knife to his hand was their reply. 
High above his gray head, to the sky, 

The sharp blade he did fling. 
Like a bird, up in the air it went ; 
Vainly they waited for its descent, 

The crystal height scanning. 
Their hats they doffed, and closer pressed they stood, 
Silent ; yea, Night herself seemed to brood ; 

But the knife did not fall. 
The ruby dawn rose over the lake, 
The stepmother, flushed, did courage take 

And scornfully did smile. 
When like a swallow the knife did dart 
To earth, and fixed itself in her heart. 



Down on their knees the people did fall 
Praising God Who is Ruler of All: 

'Thou are just, O God!' 
Iona, the fisherman, did take, 
And of him a hermit did make. 



MY CHILDHOOD 279 

Far away by the bright River Kerjentza 

In a cell almost invisible from the town Kiteja." x 

The next day I woke up covered with red spots, and 
this was the beginning of small-pox. 

They put me up in the back attic, and there I lay for 
a long time, blind, with my hands and feet tightly 
bandaged, living through horrible nightmares, in one 
of which I nearly died. No one but grandmother 
came near me, and she fed me with a spoon as if I were 
a baby, and told me stories, a fresh one every time, 
from her endless store. 

One evening, when I was convalescent, and lay with- 
out bandages, except for my hands, which were tied up 
to prevent me from scratching my face, grandmother, 
for some reason or other, had not come at her usual 
time, which alarmed me; and all of a sudden I saw her. 
She was lying outside the door on the dusty floor of 
the attic, face downwards, with her arms outspread, 
and her neck half sawed through, like Uncle Peter's; 
while from the corner, out of the dusty twilight, there 
moved slowly towards her a great cat, with its green 
eyes greedily open. I sprang out of bed, bruising my 
legs and shoulders against the window-frame, and 

1 In the year '90 in the village of Kolinpanovka, in the Government 
of Tambov, and the district Borisoglebsk, I heard another version of 
this legend, in which the knife kills the stepson who has calumniated 
his stepmother. 



280 MY CHILDHOOD 

jumped down into the yard into a snowdrift. It hap- 
pened to be an evening when mother had visitors, so no 
one heard the smashing of the glass, or the breaking of 
the window-frame, and I had to lie in the snow for 
some time. I had broken no bones, but I had dislo- 
cated my shoulder and cut myself very much with the 
broken glass, and I had lost the use of my legs, and for 
three months I lay utterly unable to move. I lay still 
and listened, and thought how noisy the house had be- 
come, how often they banged the doors downstairs, 
and what a lot of people seemed to be coming and 
going. 

Heavy snowstorms swept over the roof; the wind 
came and went resoundingly outside the door, sang a 
funereal song down the chimney, and set the dampers 
rattling ; by day the rooks cawed, and in the quiet night 
the doleful howling of wolves reached my ears — such 
was the music under whose influence my heart devel- 
oped. Later on shy spring peeped into the window 
with the radiant eyes of the March sun, timidly and 
gently at first, but growing bolder and warmer every 
day; she-cats sang and howled on the roof and in the 
loft; the rustle of spring penetrated the very walls — 
the crystal icicles broke, the half-thawed snow fell off 
the stable-roof, and the bells began to give forth a 
sound less clear than they gave in winter. When 
grandmother came near me her words were more often 



MY CHILDHOOD 281 

impregnated with the odor of vodka, which grew 
stronger every day, until at length she began to bring 
a large white teapot with her and hide it under my bed, 
saying with a wink: 

"Don't you say anything to that grandfather of 
ours, will you, darling?" 

"Why do you drink?" 

"Never mind ! When you are grown-up you '11 
know." 

She pulled at the spout of the teapot, wiped her lips 
with her sleeve, and smiled sweetly as she asked: 

"Well, my little gentleman, what do you want me 
to tell you about this evening?" 

"About my father." 

"Where shall I begin?" 

I reminded her, and her speech flowed on like a 
melodious stream for a long time. 

She had begun to tell me about my father of her 
own accord one day when she had come to me, nervous, 
sad, and tired, saying: 

"I have had a dream about your father. I thought 
I saw him coming across the fields, whistling, and 
followed by a piebald dog with its tongue hanging 
out. For some reason I have begun to dream about 
Maxim Savatyevitch very often ... it must mean 
that his soul is not at rest . . ." 

For several evenings in succession she told me my 



282 MY CHILDHOOD 

father's history, which was interesting, as all her stories 
were. 

My father was the son of a soldier who had worked 
his way up to be an officer and was banished to Siberia 
for cruelty to his subordinates; and there — somewhere 
in Siberia — my father was born. He had an unhappy 
life, and at a very early age he used to run away from 
home. Once grandfather set the dogs to track him 
down in the forest, as if he were a hare ; another time, 
having caught him, he beat him so unmercifully that 
the neighbors took the child away and hid him. 

"Do they always beat children?" I asked, and 
grandmother answered quietly: 

"Always." 

My father's mother died early, and when he was nine 
years old grandfather also died, and he was taken by 
a cross-maker, who entered him on the Guild of the 
town of Perm and began to teach him his trade ; but my 
father ran away from him, and earned his living by 
leading blind people to the fairs. When he was six- 
teen he came to Nijni and obtained work with a joiner 
who was a contractor for the Kolchin steamboats. By 
the time he was twenty he was a skilled carpenter, up- 
holsterer and decorator. The workshop in which he 
was employed was next door to grandfather's house in 
Kovalikh Street. 

"The fences were not high, and certain people were 



MY CHILDHOOD 283 

not backward," said grandmother, laughing. "So one 
day, when Varia and I were picking raspberries in the 
garden, who should get over the fence but your 
father! ... I was frightened, foolishly enough; but 
there he went amongst the apple trees, a fine-looking 
fellow, in a white shirt, and plush breeches . . . bare- 
footed and hatless, with long hair bound with leather 
bands. That 's the way he came courting. When I 
saw him for the first time through the window, I said 
to myself: 'That's a nice lad!' So when he came 
close to me now I asked him : 

" 'Why do you come out of your way like this, 
young man 4 ?' 

"And he fell on his knees. 'Akulina,' he says, 
Tvanovna ! . . . because my whole heart is here . . . 
with Varia. Help us, for God's sake! We want to 
get married.' 

"At this I was stupefied and my tongue refused to 
speak. I looked, and there was your mother, the 
rogue, hiding behind an apple tree, all red — as red as 
the raspberries — and making signs to him; but there 
were tears in her eyes. 

" 'Oh, you rogues !' I cried. 'How have you man- 
aged all this? Are you in your senses, Varvara? And 
you, young man,' I said, 'think what you are doing! 
Do you intend to get your way by force?' 

"At that time grandfather was rich, for he had not 



284 MY CHILDHOOD 

given his children their portions, and he had four 
houses of his own, and money, and he was ambitious; 
not long before that they had given him a laced hat 
and a uniform because he had been head of the Guild 
for nine years without a break — and he was proud in 
those days. I said to them what it was my duty to 
say, but all the time I trembled for fear and felt very 
sorry for them too; they had both become so gloomy. 
Then said your father: 

" T know quite well that Vassili Vassilitch will not 
consent to give Varia to me, so I shall steal her; only 
you must help us.' 

"So I was to help them. I could not help laugh- 
ing at him, but he would not be turned from his pur- 
pose. 'You may stone me or you may help me, it is 
all the same to me — I shall not give in,' he said. 

"Then Varvara went to him, laid her hand on his 
shoulder, and said : 'We have been talking of getting 
married a long time — we ought to have been married in 
May.' 

"How I started ! Good Lord !" 

Grandmother began to laugh, and her whole body 
shook; then she took a pinch of snuff, dried her eyes 
and said, sighing comfortably: 

"You can't understand diat yet . . . you don't 
know what marrying means . . . but this you can un- 
derstand — that for a girl to give birth to a child be- 



MY CHILDHOOD 285 

fore she is married is a dreadful calamity. Remem- 
ber that, and when you are grown-up never tempt a 
girl in that way ; it would be a great sin on your part — 
the girl would be disgraced, and the child illegitimate. 
See that you don't forget that ! You must be kind to 
women, and love them for their own sakes, and not for 
the sake of self-indulgence. This is good advice I am 
giving you." 

She fell into a reverie, rocking herself in her chair; 
then, shaking herself, she began again : 

"Well, what was to be done*? I hit Maxim on the 
forehead, and pulled Varia's plait; but he said rea- 
sonably enough: 'Quarreling won't put things right.' 
And she said : 'Let us think what is the best thing to 
do first, and have a row afterwards.' 

" 'Have you any money?' I asked him. 

" 'I had some,' he replied, 'but I bought Varia a ring 
with it.' 

" 'How much did you have then?' 

" 'Oh,' says he, 'about a hundred roubles.' 

"Now at that time money was scarce and things were 
dear, and I looked at the two — your mother and 
father — and I said to myself: 'What children! . . . 
What young fools!' 

" 'I hid the ring under the floor,' said your mother, 
'so that you should not see it. We can sell it.' 

"Such children they were — both of them! How- 



286 MY CHILDHOOD 

ever, we discussed the ways and means for them to be 
married in a week's time, and I promised to arrange 
the matter with the priest. But I felt very uncom- 
fortable myself, and my heart went pit-a-pat, because 
I was so frightened of grandfather; and Varia was 
frightened too, painfully so. Well, we arranged it 
all! 

"But your father had an enemy — a certain work- 
man, an evil-minded man who had guessed what was 
going on long ago, and now watched our movements. 
Well, I arrayed my only daughter in the best things 
I could get, and took her out to the gate, where there 
was a troika waiting. She got into it, Maxim whistled, 
and away they drove. I was going back to the house, 
in tears, when I ran across this man, who said in a 
cringing tone: 

" 'I have a good heart, and I shall not interfere with 
the workings of Fate; only, Akulina Ivanovna, you 
must give me fifty roubles for keeping quiet.' 

"But I had no money; I did not like it, nor care to 
save it, and so I told him, like a fool: 

" 'I have no money, so I can't give you any.' 

" 'Well,' he said, 'you can promise it to me.' 

" 'How can I do that? Where am I to get it from 
after I have promised?' 

" 'Is it so difficult to steal from a rich husband?' he 
says. 



MY CHILDHOOD 287 

" 'If I had not been a fool I should have temporized 
with him ; but I spat full in his ugly mug, and went into 
the house. And he rushed into the yard and raised a 
hue and cry." 

Closing her eyes, she said, smiling: 

"Even now I have a lively remembrance of that 
daring deed of mine. Grandfather roared like a wild 
beast, and wanted to know if they were making fun of 
him. As it happened, he had been taking stock of 
Varia lately, and boasting about her: 'I shall marry 
her to a nobleman — a gentleman !' Here was a pretty 
nobleman for him! — here was a pretty gentleman! 
But the Holy Mother of God knows better than we 
do what persons ought to be drawn together. 

"Grandfather tore about the yard as if he were on 
fire, calling Jaakov and Michael and even — at the 
suggestion of that wicked workman — Klima, the coach- 
man too. I saw him take a leathern strap with a 
weight tied on the end of it, and Michael seized his 
gun. We had good horses then, full of spirit, and 
the carriage was light. f Ah well !' I thought, 'they are 
sure to overtake them.' But here Varia's Guardian 
Angel suggested something to me. I took a knife and 
cut the ropes belonging to the shafts. 'There! they 
will break down on the road now.' And so they did. 
The shafts came unfastened on the way, and nearly 
killed grandfather and Michael — and Klima too, be- 



288 MY CHILDHOOD 

sides delaying them; and by the time they had repaired 
it, and dashed up to the church, Varia and Maxim 
were standing in the church porch married — thank 
God! 

"Then our people started a fight with Maxim; but 
he was in very good condition and he was rare and 
strong. He threw Michael away from the porch and 
broke his arm. Klima also was injured; and grand- 
father and Jaakov and that workman were all fright- 
ened! 

"Even in his rage he did not lose his presence of 
mind, but he said to grandfather: 

" 'You can throw away that strap. Don't wave it 
about over me, for I am a man of peace, and what I 
have taken is only what God gave me, and no man 
shall take from me . . . and that is all I have to say to 
you/ 

"They gave it up then, and grandfather returned to 
the carriage crying: 

" 'It is good-by now, Varvara ! You are no daugh- 
ter of mine, and I never wish to see you again, either 
alive or dead of hunger.' 

"When he came home he beat me, and he scolded 
me; but all I did was to groan and hold my tongue. 

"Everything passes away, and what is to be will be. 
After this he said to me : 



MY CHILDHOOD 289 

" 'Now, look here, Akulina, you have no daughter 
now. Remember that.' 

"But I only said to myself: 

" Tell more lies, sandy-haired, spiteful man — say 
that ice is warm !' " 

I listened attentively, greedily. Some part of her 
story surprised me, for grandfather had given quite a 
different account of mother's wedding; he said that he 
had been against the marriage and had forbidden 
mother to his house after it, but the wedding had not 
been secret, and he had been present in the church. I 
did not like to ask grandmother which of them spoke 
the truth, because her story was the more beautiful of 
the two, and I liked it best. 

When she was telling a story she rocked from side 
to side all the time, just as if she were in a boat. If 
she was relating something sad or terrible, she rocked 
more violently, and stretched out her hands as if she 
were pushing away something in the air; she often 
covered her eyes, while a sightless, kind smile hid itself 
in her wrinkled cheek, but her thick eyebrows hardly 
moved. Sometimes this uncritical friendliness of hers 
to everybody touched my heart, and sometimes I 
wished that she would use strong language and assert 
herself more. 

"At first, for two weeks, I did not know where 



290 MY CHILDHOOD 

Varvara and Maxim were; then a little barefooted 
boy was sent to tell me. I went to see them on a Sat- 
urday — I was supposed to be going to vespers, but I 
went to them instead. They lived a long way off, on 
the Suetinsk Slope, in the wing of a house overlooking 
a yard belonging to some works — a dusty, dirty, noisy 
place; but they did not mind it — they were like two 
cats, quite happy, purring, and even playing together. 
I took them what I could — tea, sugar, cereals of various 
kinds, jam, flour, dried mushrooms, and a small sum 
of money which I had got from grandfather on the 
quiet. You are allowed to steal, you know, when it is 
not for yourself. 

"But your father would not take anything. 'What ! 
Are we beggars?' he says. 

"And Varvara played the same tune. 'Ach! . . . 
What is this for, Mamasha?' 

"I gave them a lecture. 'You young fools !' I said. 
'Who am I, I should like to know? ... I am the 
mother God gave you . . . and you, silly, are my own 
flesh and blood. Are you going to offend me? Don't 
you know that when you offend your mother on earth, 
the Mother of God in Heaven weeps bitterly?' 

"Then Maxim seized me in his arms and carried me 
round the room ... he actually danced — he was 
strong, the bear! And Varvara there, the hussy, was 
as proud as a peacock of her husband, and kept looking 



MY CHILDHOOD 291 

at him as if he were a new doll, and talked about house- 
keeping with such an air — you would have thought she 
was an old hand at it ! It was comical to listen to her. 
And she gave us cheese-cakes for tea which would have 
broken the teeth of a wolf, and curds all sprinkled with 
dust. 

"Things went on like this for a long time, and your 
birth was drawing near, but still grandfather never 
said a word — he is obstinate, our old man ! I went to 
see them on the quiet, and he knew it; but he pretended 
not to. It was forbidden to any one in the house to 
speak of Varia, so she was never mentioned. I said 
nothing about her either, but I knew that a father's 
heart could not be dumb for long. And at last the 
critical moment arrived. It was night; there was a 
snowstorm raging, and it sounded as if bears were 
throwing themselves against the window. The wind 
howled down the chimneys; all the devils were let 
loose. Grandfather and I were in bed but we could 
not sleep. 

" 'It is bad for the poor on such a night as this,' I 
remarked; 'but it is worse for those whose minds are 
not at rest.' 

"Then grandfather suddenly asked: 
" 'How are they getting on 4 ? All right?' 
" 'Who are you talking about*?' I asked. 'About 
our daughter Varvara and our son-in-law Maxim?' 



292 MY CHILDHOOD 

" 'How did you guess who I meant?' 

" 'That will do, Father,' I said. 'Suppose you leave 
off playing the fool? What pleasure is to be got out 
of it? 

"He drew in his breath. 'Ach, you devil !' he said. 
'You gray devil !' 

"Later on he said: 'They say he is a great fool' 
(he was speaking of your father). 'Is it true that he 
is a fool?' 

" 'A fool,' I said, 'is a person who won't work, and 
hangs round other people's necks. You look at 
Jaakov and Michael, for instance; don't they live like 
fools? Who is the worker in this house? Who 
earns the money? You! And are they much use as 
assistants ?' 

"Then he fell to scolding me — I was a fool, an ab- 
ject creature and a bawd, and I don't know what else. 
I held my tongue. 

" 'How can you allow yourself to be taken in by a 
man like that, when no one knows where he came from 
or what he is?' 

"I kept quiet until he was tired, and then I said: 

" 'You ought to go and see how they are living. 
They are getting along all right.' 

" 'That would be doing them too much honor,' he 
said. 'Let them come here.' 



MY CHILDHOOD 293 

"At this I cried for joy, and he loosened my hair 
(he loved to play with my hair) and muttered: 

" 'Don't upset yourself, stupid. Do you think I 
have not got a heart?' 

"He used to be very good, you know, our grand- 
father, before he got an idea into his head that he was 
cleverer than any one else, and then he became spite- 
ful and stupid. 

"Well, so they came, your father and mother, one 
Saint's Day — both of them large and sleek and neat; 
and Maxim stood in front of grandfather, who laid 
a hand on his shoulder — he stood there and he 
said: 

" 'Don't think, Vassili Vassilitch, that I have come to 
you for a dowry ; I have come to do honor to my wife's 
father.' 

"Grandfather was very pleased at this, and burst 
out laughing. 'Ach! — you fighter!' he said. 'You 
robber! Well,' he said, 'we '11 be indulgent for once. 
Come and live with me.' 

"Maxim wrinkled his forehead. 'That must be as 
Varia wishes,' he said. 'It is all the same to me.' 

"And then it began. They were at each other tooth 
and nail all the time; they could not get on together 
anyhow. I used to wink at your father and kick him 
under the table, but it was no use; he would stick to 



294 MY CHILDHOOD 

his own opinion. He had very fine eyes, very bright 
and clear, and his brows were dark, and when he drew 
them together his eyes were almost hidden, and his 
face became stony and stubborn. He would not listen 
to any one but me. I loved him, if possible, more 
than my own children, and he knew this and loved me 
too. Sometimes he would hug me, and catch me up in 
his arms, and drag me round the room, saying: 'You 
are my real mother, like the earth. I love you more 
than I love Varvara.' And your mother (when she 
was happy she was very saucy) would fly at him and 
cry: 'How dare you say such a thing, you rascal?' 
And the three of us would romp together. Ah! we 
were happy then, my dear. He used to dance won- 
derfully well too — and such beautiful songs he knew. 
He picked them up from the blind people; and there 
are no better singers than the blind. 

"Well, they settled themselves in the outbuilding 
in the garden, and there you were born on the stroke 
of noon. Your father came home to dinner, and you 
were there to greet him. He was so delighted that he 
was almost beside himself, and nearly tired your mother 
out; as if he did not realize, the stupid creature, what 
an ordeal it is to bring a child into the world. He 
put me on his shoulder and carried me right across the 
yard to grandfather to tell him the news — that another 
grandson had appeared on the scene. Even grand- 



MY CHILDHOOD 295 

father laughed : What a demon you are, Maxim !' he 
said. 

"But your uncles did not like him. He did not 
drink wine, he was bold in his speech, and clever in all 
kinds of tricks — for which he was bitterly paid out. 
One day, for instance, during the great Fast, the wind 
sprang up, and all at once a terrible howling resounded 
through the house. We were all stupefied. What 
did it mean? Grandfather himself was terrified, or- 
dered lamps to be lit all over the house, and ran about, 
shouting at the top of his voice: 'We must offer up 
prayers together!' 

"And suddenly it stopped — which frightened us still 
more. Then Uncle Jaakov guessed. This is Max- 
im's doing, I am sure!' he said. And afterwards 
Maxim himself confessed that he had put bottles and 
glasses of various kinds in the dormer-window, and the 
wind blowing down the necks of the vessels produced 
the sounds, all by itself. These jokes will land you 
in Siberia again if you don't take care, Maxim,' said 
grandfather menacingly. 

"One year there was a very hard frost and wolves 
began to come into the towns from the fields; they 
killed the dogs, frightened the horses, ate up tipsy 
watchmen, and caused a great panic. But your father 
took his gun, put on his snow-shoes, and tracked down 
two wolves. He skinned them, cleaned out their 



296 MY CHILDHOOD 

heads, and put in glass eyes — made quite a good job 
of it, in fact. Well, Uncle Michael went into the ves- 
tibule for something, and came running back at 
once, with his hair on end, his eyes rolling, gasping for 
breath, and unable to speak. At length he whispered : 
'Wolf!' Every one seized anything which came to 
hand in the shape of a weapon, and rushed into the 
vestibule with lights; they looked and saw a wolf's head 
sticking out from behind a raised platform. They 
beat him, they fired at him — and what do you think 
he was? They looked closer, and saw that it was 
nothing but a skin and an empty head, and its front 
feet were nailed to the platform. This time grand- 
father was really very angry with Maxim. 

"And then Jaakov must begin to join in these pranks. 
Maxim cut a head out of cardboard, and made a nose, 
eyes, and a mouth on it, glued tow on it to represent 
hair, and then went out into the street with Jaakov, 
and thrust that dreadful face in at the windows; and 
of course people were terrified and ran away screaming. 
Another night they went out wrapped in sheets and 
frightened the priest, who rushed into a sentry-box; 
and the sentry, as much frightened as he was, called the 
police. And many other wanton tricks like this they 
played ; and nothing would stop them. I begged them 
to give up their nonsense, and so did Varia, but it was 
no good; they would not leave off. Maxim only 



MY CHILDHOOD 297 

laughed. It made his sides ache with laughing, he 
said, to see how folk ran wild with terror, and broke 
their heads because of his nonsense. 'Come and speak 
to them!' he would say. 

"And it all came back on his own head and nearly 
caused his ruin. Your Uncle Michael, who was al- 
ways with grandfather, was easily offended and vin- 
dictively disposed, and he thought out a way to get rid 
of your father. It was in the beginning of winter 
and they were coming away from a friend's house, four 
of them — Maxim, your uncles, and a deacon, who was 
degraded afterwards for killing a cabman. They came 
out of Yamski Street and persuaded Maxim to go 
round by the Dinkov Pond, pretending that they were 
going to skate. They began to slide on the ice like 
boys and drew him on to an ice-hole, and then they 
pushed him in — but I have told you about that." 

"Why are my uncles so bad?" 

"They are not bad," said grandmother calmly, tak- 
ing a pinch of snuff. "They are simply stupid. 
Mischka is cunning- and stupid as well, but Jaakov is 
a good fellow, taking him all round. Well, they 
pushed him into the water, but as he went down he 
clutched at the edge of the ice-hole, and they struck at 
his hands, crushing his fingers with their heels. By 
good luck he was sober, while they were tipsy, and with 
God's help he dragged himself from under the ice, and 



298 MY CHILDHOOD 

kept himself face upwards in the middle of the hole, 
so that he could breathe; but they could not get hold 
of him, and after a time they left him, with his head 
surrounded by ice, to drown. But he climbed out, and 
ran to the police-station — it is quite close, you know, 
in the market-place. The Inspector on duty knew him 
and all the family, and he asked : 'How did this hap- 
pen? " 

Grandmother crossed herself and went on in a grate- 
ful tone : 

"God rest the soul of Maxim Savatyevitch ! He 
deserves it, for you must know that he hid the truth 
from the police. 'It was my own fault,' he said. T 
had been drinking, and I wandered on to the pond, 
and tumbled down an ice-hole.' 

" 'That 's not true,' said the Inspector; 'you 've not 
been drinking.' 

"Well, the long and short of it was that they rubbed 
him with brandy, put dry clothes on him, wrapped him 
in a sheep-skin, and brought him home — the Inspector 
himself and two others. Jaaschka and Mischka had 
not returned; they had gone to a tavern to celebrate the 
occasion. Your mother and I looked at Maxim. He 
was quite unlike himself; his face was livid, his fingers 
were bruised, and there was dry blood on them, and 
his curls seemed to be flecked with snow — only it did 
not melt. He had turned gray ! 



MY CHILDHOOD 299 

"Varvara screamed out 'What have they done to 
you? 

"The Inspector, scenting the truth, began to ask 
questions, and I felt in my heart that something very 
bad had happened. 

"I put Varia off on to the Inspector, and I tried to 
get the truth out of Maxim quietly. What has hap- 
pened? 

" The first thing you must do,' he whispered, 'is 
to lie in wait for Jaakov and Michael and tell them 
that they are to say that they parted from me at Yam- 
ski Street and went to Pokrovski Street, while I turned 
off at Pryadilni Lane. Don't mix it up now, or we 
shall have trouble with the police.' 

"I went to grandfather and said: 'Go and talk to 
the Inspector while I go and wait for our sons to tell 
them what evil has befallen us.' 

"He dressed himself, all of a tremble, muttering: 
T knew how it would be! This is what I expected.' 

"All lies ! He knew nothing of the kind. Well, I 
met my children with my hands before my face. Fear 
sobered Mischka at once, and Jaashenka, the dear boy, 
let the cat out of the bag by babbling: T don't know 
anything about it. It is all Michael's doing. He is 
the eldest.' 

"However, we made it all right with the Inspector. 
He was a very nice gentleman. 'Oh,' he says, 'but 



300 MY CHILDHOOD 

you had better take care; if anything bad happens in 
your house I shall know who is to blame.' And with 
that he went away. 

"And grandfather went to Maxim and said: 
Thank you! Any one else in your place would not 
have acted as you have done — that I know! And 
thank you, daughter, for bringing such a good man 
into your father's house.' Grandfather could speak 
very nicely when he liked. It was after this that he 
began to be silly, and keep his heart shut up like a 
castle. 

"We three were left together. Maxim Savatyevitch 
began to cry, and became almost delirious. 'Why 
have they done this to me? What harm have I done 
them? Mama . . . why did they do it?' He never 
called me 'mamasha,' but always 'mama,' like a child 
. . . and he was really a child in character. 'Why 
... ?' he asked. 

"I cried too — what else was there for me to do? I 
was so sorry for my children. Your mother tore all 
the buttons off her bodice, and sat there, all dishevelled 
as if she had been fighting, calling out: 'Let us go 
away, Maxim. My brothers are our enemies; I am 
afraid of them. Let us go away!' 

"I tried to quieten her. 'Don't throw rubbish on 
the fire,' I said. 'The house is full of smoke without 
that.' 



MY CHILDHOOD 301 

"At that very moment that fool of a grandfather 
must go and send those two to beg forgiveness; she 
sprang at Mischka and slapped his face. There 's your 
forgiveness!' she said. And your father complained: 
'How could you do such a thing, brothers'? You 
might have crippled me. What sort of a workman 
shall I be without hands?' 

"However, they were reconciled. Your father was 
ailing for some time; for seven weeks he tossed about, 
and got no better, and he kept saying: 'Ekh! 
Mama, let us go to another town; I am weary of this 
place.' 

"Then he had a chance of going to Astrakhan; they 
expected the Emperor there in the summer, and your 
father was entrusted with the building of a triumphal 
arch. They sailed on the first boat. It cut me to the 
heart to part from them, and he was grieved about it 
too, and kept saying to me that I ought to go with them 
to Astrakhan; but Varvara rejoiced, and did not even 
try to hide her joy — the hussy! And so they went 
away . . . and that is all !" 

She drank a drop of vodka, took a pinch of snuff, 
and added, gazing out of the window at the dark blue 
sky: 

"Yes, your father and I were not of the same blood, 
but in soul we were akin." 

Sometimes, while she was telling me this, grand- 



302 MY CHILDHOOD 

father came in with his face uplifted, sniffed the air 
with his sharp nose, and looking suspiciously at grand- 
mother, listened to what she was saying and muttered : 

"That's not true! That's not true!" 

Then he would ask, without warning: 

"Lexei, has she been drinking brandy here?" 

"No." 

"That 's a lie, for I saw her with my own eyes !" 
And he would go out in an undecided manner. 

Grandmother would wink at him behind his back 
and utter some quaint saying : 

"Go along, Avdye, and don't frighten the horses." 

One day, as he stood in the middle of the room, 
staring at the floor, he said softly: 

"Mother?" 

"Aye?" 

"You see what is going on?" 

"Yes, I see!" 

"What do you think of it?" 

"There '11 be a wedding, Father. Do you remem- 
ber how you used to talk about a nobleman?" 

"Yes." 

"Well— here he is !" 

"He 's got nothing." 

"That 's her business." 

Grandfather left the room, and conscious of a sense 
of uneasiness, I asked: 



MY CHILDHOOD 303 

"What were you talking about?" 

"You want to know everything," she replied quer- 
ulously, rubbing my feet. "If you know everything 
when you are young, there will be nothing to ask ques- 
tions about when you get old." And she laughed and 
shook her head at me. 

"Oh, grandfather! grandfather! you are nothing 
but a little piece of dust in the eyes of God. Lenka 
— now don't you tell any one this, but grandfather is 
absolutely ruined. He lent a certain gentleman a large 
sum of money, and now the gentleman has gone bank- 
rupt." 

Smiling, she fell into a reverie, and sat without 
speaking for a long time ; and her face became wrinkled, 
and sad, and gloomy. 

"What are you thinking about?" 

"I am thinking of something to tell you," she an- 
swered, with a start. "Shall we have the story about 
Evstignia? Will that do? Well, here goes then. 

"A deacon there was called Evstignia, 
He thought there was no one more wise than he, 
Be he presbyter, or be he boyard ; 
Not even a huntsman knew more than he. 
Like a spike of spear grass he held himself, 
So proud, and taught his neighbors great and small ; 
He found fault with this, and grumbled at that ; 
He glanced at a church — 'Not lofty enough !' 



304 MY CHILDHOOD 

He passed up a street — 'How narrow!' he said. 
An apple he plucked — 'It not red !' he said. 
The sun rose too soon for Evstignia! 
In all the world there was nothing quite right!" 

Grandmother puffed out her cheeks, and rolled her 
eyes; her kind face assumed a stupid, comical expres- 
sion as she went on in a lazy, dragging voice: 

" 'There is nothing I could not do myself, 
And do it much better, I think,' he said, 
'If I only had a little more time !' " 

She was smilingly silent for a moment, and then 
she continued : 

"To the deacon one night some devils came ; 
'So you find it dull here, deacon T they said. 
'Well, come along with us, old fellow, to hell, 
You '11 have no fault to find with the fires there/ 
Ere the wise deacon could put on his hat 
The devils seized hold of him with their paws 
And, with titters and howls, they dragged him down. 
A devil on each of his shoulders sat, 
And there, in the flames of hell they set him. 
'Is it all right, Evstignyeushka V 
The deacon was roasting, brightly he burned, 
Kept himself up with his hands to his sides, 
Puffed out his lips as he scornfully said: 
Tt 's dreadfully smoky down here — in hell !' " 

Concluding in an indolent, low-pitched, unctuous 
voice, she changed her expression and, laughing quietly, 
explained : 



MY CHILDHOOD 305 

"He would not give in — that Evstignia, but stuck 
to his own opinion obstinately, like our grandfather. 
. . . That 's enough now; go to sleep; it is high time." 

Mother came up to the attic to see me very seldom, 
and she did not stay long, and spoke as if she were in 
a hurry. She was getting more beautiful, and was 
dressed better every day, but I was conscious of some- 
thing different about her, as about grandmother ; I felt 
that there was something going on which was being 
kept from me — and I tried to guess what it was. 

Grandmother's stories interested me less and less, 
even the ones she told me about my father; and they 
did not soothe my indefinable but daily increasing 
alarm. 

"Why is my father's soul not at rest?" I asked grand- 
mother. 

"How can I tell?" she replied, covering her eyes. 
"That is God's affair ... it is supernatural . . . and 
hidden from us." 

At night, as I gazed sleeplessly through the dark blue 
windows at the stars floating so slowly across the sky, 
I made up some sad story in my mind — in which the 
chief place was occupied by my father, who was always 
wandering about alone, with a stick in his hand, and 
with a shaggy dog behind him. 



CHAPTER XII 

ONE day I fell asleep before the evening, and when 
I woke up I felt that my legs had waked up too. 
I put them out of bed, and they became numb again; 
but the fact remained that my legs were cured and that 
I should be able to walk. This was such glorious news 
that I shouted for joy, and put my feet to the floor with 
the whole weight of my body on them. I fell down, 
but I crawled to the door and down the staircase, 
vividly representing to myself the surprise of those 
downstairs when they should see me. 

I do not remember how I got into mother's room 
on my knees; but there were some strangers with her, 
and one, a dried-up old woman in green, said sternly, 
drowning all other voices: 

"Give him some raspberry syrup to drink, and cover 
up his head." 

She was green all over: her dress, and hat, and her 

face, which had warts under the eyes; even the tufts 

of hair on the warts were like grass. Letting her 

lower lip droop, she raised the upper one and looked at 

me with her green teeth, covering her eyes with a hand 

in a black thread mitten. 

306 



MY CHILDHOOD 307 

"Who is that?" I asked, suddenly growing timid. 

Grandfather answered in a disagreeable voice: 

"That 's another grandmother for you." 

Mother, laughing, brought Eugen Maximov to me. 

"And here is your father !" 

She said something rapidly which I did not under- 
stand, and Maximov, with twinkling eyes, bent towards 
me and said : 

"I will make you a present of some paints." 

The room was lit up very brightly; silver candelabra, 
holding five candles each, stood on the table, and be- 
tween them was placed grandfather's favorite icon — 
"Mourn not for me, Mother." The pearls with which 
it was set gave forth an intermittent brilliancy as the 
lights played on them flickeringly, and the gems in the 
golden crown shone radiantly; heavy, round faces like 
pancakes were pressing against the window-panes from 
outside, flattening their noses against the glass, and 
everything round me seemed to be floating. The old 
green woman felt my ears with her cold fingers and 
said: 

"By all means! By all means!" 

"He is fainting," said grandmother, and she carried 
me to the door. 

But I was not fainting. I just kept my eyes shut, 
and as soon as she had half-dragged, half-carried me up 
the staircase, I asked: 



308 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Why was n't I told of this?" 

"That will do. . . . Hold your tongue !" 

"You are deceivers — all of you!" 

Laying me on the bed, she threw herself down with 
her head on the pillow and burst into tears, shaking 
from head to foot; her shoulders heaved, and she mut- 
tered chokingly: 

"Why don't you cry?" 

I had no desire to cry. It was twilight in the attic, 
and cold. I shuddered, and the bed shook and 
creaked; and ever before my eyes stood the old green 
woman. I pretended to be asleep, and grandmother 
went away. 

Several uneventful days, all alike, flowed by like a 
thin stream. Mother had gone away somewhere after 
the betrothal, and the house was oppressively quiet. 

One morning grandfather came in with a chisel and 
began to break away the cement around the attic win- 
dow-frames which were put in for the winter; then 
grandmother appeared with a basin of water and a 
cloth, and grandfather asked softly: 

"Well, old woman, what do you think of it?" 

"What do you mean?" 

"Well, are you pleased, or what?" 

She answered him as she had answered me on the 
staircase : 

"That will do. . . . Hold your tongue !" 



MY CHILDHOOD 309 

The simplest words had a peculiar significance for 
me now, and I imagined that they concealed some- 
thing of tremendous import and sorrow of which no 
one might speak, but of which every one knew. 

Carefully taking out the window-frame, grand- 
father carried it away, and grandmother went to the 
window and breathed the air. In the garden the 
starling was calling; the sparrows chirped; the in- 
toxicating odor of the thawing earth floated into the 
room. The dark blue tiles of the stove seemed to turn 
pale with confusion ; it made one cold to look at them. 
I climbed down from the bed to the floor. 

"Don't go running about with your feet bare," said 
grandmother. 

"I am going into the garden." 

"It is not dry enough there yet. Wait a bit!" 

But I would not listen to her; in fact the very sight 
of grown-up people affected me unpleasantly now. 
In the garden the light green spikes of young grass were 
already pushing their way through, the buds on the 
apple trees were swelling and ready to break, the moss 
on the roof of Petrovna's cottage was very pleasing to 
the eye in its renewed green; all around were birds, 
and sounds of joy, and the fresh, fragrant air caused a 
pleasant sensation of giddiness. By the pit, where 
Uncle Peter cut his throat, there was long grass — 
red, and mixed up with the broken snow. I did not 



310 MY CHILDHOOD 

like looking at it; there was nothing spring-like about 
it. The black chimney-stack reared itself up deject- 
edly, and the whole pit was an unnecessary eyesore. 
I was seized with an angry desire to tear up and break 
off the long grass, to pull the chimney-stack to pieces 
brick by brick, and get rid of all that useless muck, 
and to build a clean dwelling for myself in the pit, 
where I could live all the summer without grown-up 
people. 

I had no sooner thought of it than I set myself to 
do it, and it immediately diverted my mind from what 
went on in the house, and kept it occupied for a long 
time; and although many things occurred to upset me, 
they became of less importance to me every day. 

"What are you sulking about?" mother and grand- 
mother used to ask me; and it made me feel awkward 
when they asked this question, for I was not angry 
with them — it was simply that every one in the house 
had become a stranger to me. At dinner, at evening 
tea, and supper the old, green woman often appeared 
— looking just like a rotten paling in an old fence. 
The eyes seemed to be sewn on her face with invisible 
threads, and looked as if they would easily roll out of 
their bony sockets, as she turned them rapidly in every 
direction, seeing and taking notes of everything — rais- 
ing them to the ceiling when she talked of God, and 
looking down her nose when she spoke of household 



MY CHILDHOOD 311 

matters. Her eyebrows looked exactly as if they had 
been cut out of pieces and stuck on. Her large, protrud- 
ing teeth noiselessly chewed whatever she put in her 
mouth with a funny curve of her arm, and her little 
finger stuck out; while the bones about her ears moved 
like little round balls, and the green hairs on her warts 
went up and down as if they were creeping along her 
yellow, wrinkled, disgustingly clean skin. 

She was always so very clean — like her son, and it 
was unpleasant to go near them. The first day she 
put her dead hand against my lips, it smelled strongly 
of yellow Kazan soap and incense, and I turned away 
and ran off. She said to her son very often : 

"That boy is greatly in need of discipline; do you 
understand that, Jenia*?" 

Inclining his head obediently, he would frown and 
remain silent. Every one frowned in the presence of 
the green woman. 

I hated the old woman, and her son too, with an in- 
tense hatred, and many blows did that feeling cost me. 
One day at dinner she said, rolling her eyes horribly: 

"Oh — Aleshenka, why do you eat in such a hurry, 
and take such big pieces? Give it up, my dear!" 

I took the piece out of my mouth, put it on the fork 
again, and handed it to her. 

"Take it — only it is hot." 

Mother took me away from the table, and I was 



3 i2 MY CHILDHOOD 

ignominiously banished to the attic, where grandmother 
joined me, trying to keep her giggling from being heard 
by placing her hand over her mouth. 

"Lor ! you are a cheeky young monkey. Bless you !" 

It irritated me to see her with her hand over her 
mouth, so I ran away, climbed on the roof of the house, 
and sat there a long time by the chimney. Yes, I 
wanted to be insolent and to use injurious words to 
them all, and it was hard to fight against this feeling, 
but it had to be fought against. 

One day I covered the chair of my future stepfather 
with grease, and that of my new grandmother with 
cherry-gum, and they both stuck to their seats ; it was 
very funny, but when grandfather had hit me, mother 
came up to me in the attic, and drawing me to her, 
pressed me against her knees saying: 

"Listen now ! Why are you so ill-natured % If you 
only knew how miserable it makes me." And her eyes 
overflowed with bright tears as she pressed my head 
against her cheek. 

This was very painful; I had rather she had struck 
me. I told her I would never again be rude to the 
Maximovs — never again, if only she would not cry. 

'There, there!" she said softly. "Only you must 
not be impudent. Very soon we shall be married, and 
then we shall go to Moscow ; afterwards we shall come 
back and you will live with us. Eugen Vassilivitch is 



MY CHILDHOOD 313 

very kind and clever, and you will get on well with 
him. You will go to a grammar school, and after- 
wards you shall be a student — like he is now ; then you 
shall be a doctor — whatever you like. You may study 
whatever you choose. Now run and play." 

These "afterwards" and "thens" one after the other 
seemed to me like a staircase leading to some place deep 
down and far away from her, into darkness and solitude 
— a staircase which led to no happiness for me. I had 
a good mind to say to my mother : 

"Please don't get married. I will earn money for 
your keep." 

But somehow the words would not come. Mother 
always aroused in me many tender thoughts about her- 
self, but I never could make up my mind to tell them 
to her. 

My undertaking in the garden was progressing; I 
pulled up the long grass, or cut it down with a knife, 
and I built, with pieces of brick, against the edge of 
the pit where the earth had fallen away, a broad seat, 
large enough, in fact, to lie down upon. I took a lot 
of pieces of colored glass and fragments of broken 
crockery and stuck them in the chinks between the 
bricks, and when the sun looked into the pit they all 
shorte with a rainbow effect, like one sees in churches. 

"Very well thought out!" said grandfather one day, 
looking at my work. "Only you have broken off the 



3H MY CHILDHOOD 

grass and left the roots. Give me your spade and I will 
dig them up for you; come, bring it to me! 5 ' 

I brought him the yellow spade ; he spat on his hands, 
and making a noise like a duck, drove the spade into 
the earth with his foot. 

"Throw away the roots," he said. "Later on I will 
plant some sunflowers here for you, and some rasp- 
berry bushes. That will be nice — very nice!" And 
then, bending over his spade, he fell into a dead si- 
lence. 

I looked at him ; fine tear-drops were falling fast from 
his small, intelligent, doglike eyes to the ground. 

"What is the matter*?" 

He shook himself, wiped his face with his palms, and 
dimly regarded me. 

"I was sweating. Look there — what a lot of 



worms !" 



Then he began to dig again, and after a time he said 
abruptly : 

"You have done all this for nothing — for nothing, 
my boy. I am going to sell the house soon. I must 
sell it before autumn without fail. I want the money 
for your mother's dowry. That 's what it is ! I hope 
she will be happy. God bless her!" 

He threw down the spade, and with a gesture of re- 
nunciation went behind the washhouse where he had 



MY CHILDHOOD 315 

a forcing-bed, and I began to dig; but almost at once 
I crushed my toes with the spade. 

This prevented me from going to the church with 
mother when she was married; I could only get as far 
as the gate, and from there I saw her on Maximov's 
arm, with her head bowed, carefully setting her feet 
on the pavement and on the green grass, and stepping 
over the crevices as if she were walking on sharp nails. 

It was a quiet wedding. When they came back from 
church they drank tea in a depressed manner, and 
mother changed her dress directly and went to her own 
room to pack up. My stepfather came and sat beside 
me, and said: 

"I promised to give you some paints, but there are 
no good ones to be got in this town, and I cannot give 
my own away; but I will bring you some from Mos- 
cow." 

"And what shall I do with them?" 

"Don't you like drawing?" 

C T don't know how to draw." 

"Well, I will bring you something else." 

Then mother came in. 

"We shall soon come back, you know. Your father, 
there, has to sit for an examination, and when he has 
finished his studies we shall come back." 

I was pleased that they should talk to me like this, 



316 MY CHILDHOOD 

as if I were grown-up; but it was very strange to hear 
that a man with a beard was still learning. 

"What are you learning'?" I asked. 

"Surveying," he replied. 

I did not trouble to ask what surveying was. The 
house seemed to be full of a dull quietness; there was 
a woolly sort of rustling going on, and I wished that the 
night would make haste and come. Grandfather stood 
with his back pressed against the stove, gazing out of 
the window with a frown. The old green woman was 
helping mother to pack, grumbling and sighing; and 
grandmother, who had been tipsy since noon, ashamed 
on that account, had retired to the attic and shut her- 
self up there. 

Mother went away early the next morning. She 
held me in her arms as she took leave of me; lifting 
me lightly off the ground, and gazing into my eyes with 
eyes which seemed unfamiliar to me, she said as she 
kissed me : 

"Well— good-by." 

"Tell him that he has got to obey me," said grand- 
father gruffly, looking up at the sky which was still 
rosy. 

"Do what grandfather tells you," said mother, mak- 
ing the sign of the Cross over me. 

I expected her to say something else, and I was furi- 
ous with grandfather because he had prevented her. 



MY CHILDHOOD 317 

They seated themselves in the droshky, and mother 
was a long time angrily trying to free her skirt which 
had got caught in something. 

"Help her, can't you? Are you blind?" said grand- 
father to me. 

But I could not help — I was too wrapped up in my 
grief. 

Maximov patiently squeezed his long legs, clothed 
in dark blue trousers, into the droshky, while grand- 
mother put some bundles into his hand. He piled them 
up on his knees, and keeping them in place with his chin, 
his white face wrinkled with embarrassment, he 
drawled: "That's eno — ugh!" 

In another droshky sat the old green woman with 
her eldest son, the officer, who was scratching his beard 
with his sword handle, and yawning. 

"So you are going to the war?" said grandfather. 

"I am compelled to go." 

"A good thing too ! ... we must beat the Turks." 

They drove off. Mother turned round several times 
and waved her handkerchief. Grandmother, dissolved 
in tears, supporting herself by resting her hand against 
the wall, also waved her hand. Grandfather wiped 
away the tears from his eyes and muttered brokenly: 
"No good — will come — of this." 

I sat on the gate-post and watched the droshky jolt- 
ing up and down — and then they turned the corner and 



318 MY CHILDHOOD 

it seemed as if a door in my heart had been suddenly 
shut and barred. It was very early, the shutters had 
not been taken from the windows of the houses, the 
street was empty ; I had never seen such an utter absence 
of life. In the distance the shepherd could be heard 
playing irritatingly. 

"Come in to breakfast," said grandfather, taking me 
by the shoulder. "It is evident that your lot is to live 
with me; so you are beginning to leave your mark on 
me like the striking of a match leaves on a brick." 

From morning till night we busied ourselves in the 
garden; he laid out beds, tied up the raspberry bushes, 
stripped the lichen off the apple trees, and killed the 
caterpillars, while I went on building and decorating 
my dwelling. Grandfather cut off the end of the burnt 
beam, made sticks out of it, and stuck them in the earth, 
and I hung my bird-cages on them ; then I wove a close 
netting with the dried grass, and made a canopy over 
the seat to keep off the sun and the dew. The result 
was very satisfactory. 

"It is very useful," said grandfather, "for you to 
learn how to make the best of things for yourself." 

I attached great importance to his words. Some- 
times he lay down on the seat, which I had covered 
with turf, and taught me, very slowly, as if he had a 
difficulty in finding words. 

"Now you are cut right off from your mother; 



MY CHILDHOOD 319 

other children will come to her, and they will be more 
to her than you are. And grandmother there — she has 
taken to drink." 

He was silent for a long time as if he were listen- 
ing to something; then again he unwillingly let fall 
gloomy words: 

"This is the second time she has taken to drink; 
when Michael went for a soldier she started to drink 
too. And the old fool persuaded me to buy his dis- 
charge. . . . He might have turned out quite differ- 
ently if he had gone for a soldier. . . . Ugh! . . . 
You . . . ! I shall be dead soon — that means that 
you will be left alone ... all on your own ... to 
earn your living. Do you understand? . . . Good! 
. . . You must learn to work for yourself . . . and 
don't give way to others! Live quietly, peaceably — 
and uprightly. Listen to what others say, but do what 
is best for yourself." 

All the summer, except, of course, when the weather 
was bad, I lived in the garden, and on warm nights I 
even slept out there on a piece of felt which grand- 
mother had made me a present of; not infrequently 
she slept in the garden herself, and bringing out a 
bundle of hay, which she spread out close to my couch, 
she would lie down on it and tell me stories for a long 
time, interrupting her speech from time to time by ir- 
relevant remarks : 



320 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Look! ... A star fell then! That is some pure 
soul suffering ... a mother thinking of earth ! That 
means that a good man or woman has just been born." 

Or she would point out to me : 

"There 's a new star appeared; look! It looks like 
a large eye. . . . Oh, you bright creature of the sky! 
. . . You holy ornament of God ! . . ." 

"You will catch cold, you silly woman!" grand- 
father would growl, "and have an apoplectic fit. 
Thieves will come and kill you." 

Sometimes, when the sun set, rivers of light streamed 
across the sky, looking as if they were on fire, and 
red-gold ashes seemed to fall on the velvety-green gar- 
den; then everything became perceptibly a shade 
darker, and seemed to grow larger — to swell, as the 
warm twilight closed round. Tired of the sun, the 
leaves drooped, the grass bowed its head; everything 
seemed to be softer and richer, and gently breathed out 
various odors as soothing as music. And music there 
was, too, floating from the camps in the fields, where 
they were playing spasmodically. 

Night came, and with it there came into one's heart 
something vigorous and fresh, like the loving caress of 
a mother; the quietness softly smoothed one's heart 
with its warm, rough hands, and all that ought to be 
forgotten — all the bitterness, the fine dust of the day — 
was washed away. It was enchanting to lie with up- 



MY CHILDHOOD 321 

turned face watching the stars flaming in the infinite 
profundity of the sky — a profundity which, as it 
stretches higher and higher, opens out a new vista of 
stars; to raise yourself lightly from the ground and — 
how strange! — either the earth has grown smaller be- 
fore your eyes, or you yourself, grown wonderfully big, 
are being absorbed into your surroundings. It grows 
darker and quieter every moment, but there is a suc- 
cession of minute, hardly perceptible, prolonged sounds, 
and each sound — whether it be a bird singing in its 
sleep, or a hedgehog running along, or a human voice 
softly raised somewhere — differs from the sounds of 
daytime, and has something peculiarly its own, amo- 
rously underlying its sensitive quietness. 

A harmonium is being played somewhere, a woman's 
laugh rings out, a sword rattles on the stone flags of 
the pavement, a dog yelps — but all these sounds are 
nothing more than the falling of the last leaves of the 
day which has blossomed and died. 

Sometimes in the night a drunken cry would sud- 
denly rise from the field or the street, and the sound of 
some one running noisily; but this was a common occur- 
rence, and passed unheeded. 

Grandmother never slept long, and as she lay with 
her head resting on her folded arms, she would begin, 
at the slightest hint, to tell me a story, obviously not 
caring whether I was listening to her or not. She was 



322 MY CHILDHOOD 

always able to choose stories which would make the 
night still more precious and beautiful to me. 

Under the influence of her measured flow of words 
I insensibly sank into slumber, and awoke with the 
birds ; the sun was looking straight into my eyes, and, 
warmed by his rays, the morning air flowed softly 
round us, the leaves of the apple tree were shaking off 
the dew, the moist green grass looked brighter and 
fresher than ever, with its newly acquired crystal trans- 
parency, and a faint mist floated over it. High up in 
the sky, so high as to be invisible, a lark sang, and all 
the colors and sounds produced by the dew evoked a 
peaceful gladness, and aroused a desire to get up at once 
and do some work, and to live in amity with all living 
creatures. 

This was the quietest and most contemplative period 
of my whole life, and it was during this summer that 
the consciousness of my own strength took root and 
developed in me. I became shy and unsociable, and 
when I heard the shouts of the Ovsyanikov children I 
had no desire to go to them; and when my cousins 
came, I was more than a little annoyed, and the only 
feeling they aroused in me was the fear lest they should 
destroy my structure in the garden — the first work I 
had ever done by myself. 

Grandfather's conversation, drier, more querulous, 
and more doleful every day, had lost all interest for 



MY CHILDHOOD 323 

me. He had taken to quarreling with grandmother 
frequently, and to turn her out of the house, when 
she would go either to Uncle Jaakov's or to Uncle 
Michael's. Once she stayed away for several days 
and grandfather did all the cooking himself, burned 
his hands, roared with pain, swore, and smashed the 
crockery, and developed a noticeable greediness. 
Sometimes he would come to my hut, make himself 
comfortable on the turfy seat, and after watching me in 
silence for some time, would ask abruptly: 

"Why are you so quiet ?" 

"Because I feel like it. Why? 5 

Then he would begin his sermon : 

"We are not gentlefolk. No one takes the trouble 
to teach us. We have got to find everything out for 
ourselves. For other folk they write books, and build 
schools; but no time is wasted on us. We have to 
make our own way." 

And he fell into a brooding silence — sitting motion- 
less, oblivious, till his presence became almost oppres- 
sive. 

He sold the house in the autumn, and not long 
before the sale he exclaimed abruptly one morning, over 
his tea: 

"Well, Mother, I have fed and clothed you — fed 
and clothed you — but the time has come for you to earn 
your own bread." 



324 MY CHILDHOOD 

Grandmother received this announcement quite 
calmly, as if she had been expecting it a long time. 
She reached for her snuff-box in a leisurely manner, 
charged her spongy nose, and said : 

"Well, that's all right! If it. is to be like that, so 
let it be." 

Grandfather took two dark rooms in the basement 
of an old house, at the foot of a small hill. 

When we went to this lodging, grandmother took 
an old bast shoe, put it under the stove, and, squat- 
ting on her heels, invoked the house-demon : 

"House-demon, family-demon, here is your sledge; 
come to us in our new home, and bring us good luck." 

Grandfather looked in at the window from the yard, 
crying: "I will make you smart for this, you heretic! 
You are trying to put me to shame." 

"Oie! Take care that you don't bring harm to 
yourself, Father," said grandmother seriously; but he 
only raged at her, and forbade her to invoke the house- 
demon. 

The furniture and effects were sold by him to a 
second-hand dealer who was a Tartar, after three days' 
bargaining and abuse of each other; and grandmother 
looked out of the window, sometimes crying and some- 
times laughing, and exclaiming under her breath: 

"That's right! Drag them about. Smash them." 



MY CHILDHOOD 325 

I was ready to weep myself as I mourned for my 
garden and my little hut. 

We journeyed thither in two carts, and the one 
wherein I was placed, amongst various utensils, jolted 
alarmingly, as if it were going to throw me out then 
and there, with a part of the load. And for two years, 
till close upon the time of my mother's death, I was 
dominated with the idea that I had been thrown out 
somewhere. Soon after the move mother made her 
appearance, just as grandfather had settled down in his 
basement, very pale and thin, and with her great eyes 
strangely brilliant. She stared just as if she were see- 
ing her father and mother and me for the first time — 
just stared, and said nothing; while my stepfather 
moved about the room, whistling softly, and clearing 
his throat, with his hands behind his back and his fin- 
gers twitching. 

"Lord! how dreadfully you have grown," said 
mother to me, pressing her hot hands to my cheeks. 
She was dressed unattractively in a full brown dress, 
and she looked very swollen about the stomach. 

My stepfather held out his hand to me. 

"How do you do, my lad? How are you getting 
on?" Then sniffing the air, he added: "Do you 
know it is very damp down here?" 

They both looked worn out, as if they had been 



326 MY CHILDHOOD 

running for a long time; their clothes were in dis- 
order, and soiled, and all they wanted, they said, was 
to lie down and rest. As they drank some tea with 
an air of constraint, grandfather, gazing at the rain- 
washed windows, asked: 

"And so you have lost everything in a fire*?" 

"Everything !" answered my stepfather in a resolute 
tone. "We only escaped ourselves by good luck." 

"So! ... A fire is no joke." 

Leaning against grandmother's shoulder, my mother 
whispered something in her ear, and grandmother 
blinked as if the light were in her eyes. The air of 
constraint grew more noticeable. 

Suddenly grandfather said very clearly, in a cool, 
malicious tone: 

"The rumor which came to my ears, Eugen Vassilev, 
my good sir, said that there was no fire, but that you 
simply lost everything at cards." 

There was a dead silence, broken only by the hiss- 
ing of the samovar and the splashing of the rain against 
the window-panes; at length mother said in a persua- 
sive tone: 

"Papasha— " 

"What do you mean — 'papasha'?" cried grand- 
father in a deafening voice. "What next? Did n't 
I tell you that a person of thirty does not go well with 
one of twenty years? . . . There you are . . . and 



MY CHILDHOOD 327 

there he is — cunning rogue! A nobleman! . . . 
What? . . . Well, little daughter?" 

They all four shouted at the tops of their voices, 
and my stepfather shouted loudest of all. I went out 
to the porch and sat on a heap of wood, stupefied by 
my amazement at finding mother so changed, so dif- 
ferent from what she used to be. This fact had not 
struck me so forcibly when I was in the room with her, 
as it did now in the twilight with the memory of what 
she had been clearly before my mind. 

Later on, though I have forgotten the circumstances 
connected with it, I found myself at Sormova, in a 
house where everything was new; the walls were bare 
and hemp grew out of the chinks between the beams, 
and in the hemp were a lot of cockroaches. Mother 
and my stepfather lived in two rooms with windows 
looking on to the street, and I lived with grandmother 
in the kitchen, which had one window looking out on 
the roof. On the other side of the roof the chimneys 
of a factory rose up to the sky, belching forth a thick 
smoke, and the winter wind blew this smoke over the 
entire village; and our cold rooms were always filled 
with the odor of something burning. Early in the 
morning the wolves howled: "Khvou — ou — ou — 



u— !" 



By standing on a stool one could see through the 
top window-pane, across the roof, the gate of the fac- 



328 MY CHILDHOOD 

tory lit up by lanterns, half-open like the black, tooth- 
less mouth of an old beggar, and a crowd of little peo- 
ple crawling into it. At noon the black lips of the 
gate again opened and the factory disgorged its 
chewed-up people, who flowed along the street in a 
black stream till a rough, snowy wind came flying along 
and drove them into their houses. We very seldom 
saw the sky over the village; from day to day, over 
the roofs of the houses, and over the snow-drifts 
sprinkled with soot, hung another roof, gray and flat, 
which crushed the imagination, and blinded one with 
its overwhelming drabness. 

In the evenings a dim red glow quivered over the 
factory, lighting up the chimney-pots, and making the 
chimneys look, not as if they rose from the earth to the 
sky, but as if they were falling to the earth from that 
smoky cloud ; and as they fell they seemed to be breath- 
ing out flames, and howling. 

It was unbearably tedious to look at all this, and 
the monotony of it preyed evilly on my heart. 
Grandmother did the work of a general servant, cooked, 
washed the floors, chopped wood, and fetched water 
from morning till night, and came to bed weary, 
grumbling, and sighing. Sometimes when she had 
finished cooking she would put on her short, padded 
bodice, and with her skirt well lifted, she would repair 
to the town. 



MY CHILDHOOD 329 

"I will go and have a look at the old man, and see 
how he is getting on." 

"Take me with you." 

"You would be frozen. Look how it is snowing!" 
And she would walk seven versts, by the roads, or 
across the snowy fields. 

Mother, yellow, pregnant, and shivering with cold, 
went about wrapped in a gray, torn shawl with a fringe. 

I hated that shawl, which disfigured the large, well- 
built body; I hated the tails of the fringe, and tore 
them off; I hated the house, the factory, and the vil- 
lage. Mother went about in downtrodden felt boots, 
coughing all the time, and her unbecomingly fat stom- 
ach heaved, her gray-blue eyes had a bright, hard gleam 
in them, and she often stood about against the bare 
walls just as if she were glued to them. Sometimes 
she would stand for a whole hour looking out of the 
window on to the street, which was like a jaw in which 
half the teeth were blackened and crooked from age, 
and the other half had quite decayed and had been re- 
placed by false ones. 

"Why do we live here 4 ?" I asked. 

"Ach! . . . You hold your tongue, can't you?" she 
answered. 

She spoke very seldom to me, and when she did 
speak it was only to order me about : 

"Go there! . . . Come here! . . . Fetch this!" 



330 MY CHILDHOOD 

I was not often allowed out in the street, and on 
each occasion I returned home bearing signs of having 
been knocked about by other boys ; for fighting was my 
favorite, indeed, my only enjoyment, and I threw my- 
self into it with ardor. Mother whipped me with a 
strap, but the punishment only irritated me further, and 
the next time I fought with childish fury — and mother 
gave me a worse punishment. This went on till one 
day I warned her that if she did not leave off beating 
me I should bite her hand, and run away to the fields 
and get frozen to death. She pushed me away from 
her in amazement, and walked about the room, panting 
from exhaustion as she said: 

"You are getting like a wild animal !" 

That feeling which is called love began to blossom 
in my heart now, full of life, and tremulous as a rain- 
bow; and my resentment against every one burst out 
oftener, like a dark blue, smoky flame, and an oppres- 
sive feeling of irritation smoldered in my heart — a 
consciousness of being entirely alone in that gray, 
meaningless existence. 

My stepfather was severe with me, and hardly ever 
speaking to mother, went about whistling or coughing, 
and after dinner would stand in front of a mirror and 
assiduously pick his uneven teeth with a splinter of 
wood. His quarrels with mother became more fre- 
quent — angrily addressing her as "you" (instead of 



MY CHILDHOOD 331 

"thou"), a habit which exasperated me beyond meas- 
ure. When there was a quarrel on he used to shut the 
kitchen door closely, evidently not wishing me to hear 
what he said, but all the same the sound of his deep 
bass voice could be heard quite plainly. One day he 
cried, with a stamp of his foot: 

"Just because you are fool enough to become preg- 
nant, I can't ask any one to come and see me — you 



cow!" 



I was so astonished, so furiously angry, that I jumped 
up in the air so high that I knocked my head against 
the ceiling and bit my tongue till it bled. 

On Saturdays workmen came in batches of ten to 
see my stepfather and sell him their food-tickets, which 
they ought to have taken to the shop belonging to the 
works to spend in place of money; but my stepfather 
used to buy them at half-price. He received the work- 
men in the kitchen, sitting at the table, looking very 
important, and as he took the cards he would frown 
and say: 

"A rouble and a half!" 

"Now, Eugen Vassilev, for the love of God — " 

"A rouble and a half!" 

This muddled, gloomy existence only lasted till 
mother's confinement, when I was sent back to grand- 
father. He was then living at Kunavin, where he 
rented a poky room with a Russian stove, and two win- 



332 MY CHILDHOOD 

dows looking on to the yard, in a two-storied house on 
a sandy road, which extended to the fence of the Na- 
polno churchyard. 

"What's this?" he cried, squeaking with laughter, 
as he met me. "They say there 's no better friend 
than your own mother; but now, it seems, it is not 
the mother but the old devil of a grandfather who is 
the friend. Ugh — you J" 

Before I had time to look about my new home 
grandmother arrived with mother and the baby. My 
stepfather had been dismissed from the works for pil- 
fering from the workmen, but he had gone after other 
employment and had been taken on in the booking- 
office of the railway station almost at once. 

After a long, uneventful period, once more I was 
living with mother in the basement of a storehouse. 
As soon as she was settled mother sent me to school — 
and from the very first I took a dislike to it. 

I went thither in mother's shoes, with a coat made 
out of a bodice belonging to grandmother, a yellow 
shirt, and trousers which had been lengthened. My 
attire immediately became an object of ridicule, and 
for the yellow shirt I received "The ace of diamonds." 

I soon became friendly with the boys, but the mas- 
ter and the priest did not like me. 

The master was a jaundiced-looking, bold man who 
suffered from a continuous bleeding of the nose; he 




"mother SENT ME TO S( 



DL — AND FROM THE FIRST I TOOK A DISLIKE 
TO IT" 



MY CHILDHOOD 333 

used to appear in the schoolroom with his nostrils 
stopped up with cotton-wool, and as he sat at his table, 
asking us questions in snuffling tones, he would sud- 
denly stop in the middle of a word, take the wool out 
of his nostrils and look at it, shaking his head. He had 
a flat, copper-colored face, with a sour expression, and 
there was a greenish tint in his wrinkles; but it was 
his literally pewter-colored eyes which were the most 
hideous feature of it, and they were so unpleasantly 
glued to my face that I used to feel that I must brush 
them off my cheek with my hands. 

For several days I was in the first division, and at 
the top of the class, quite close to the master's table, 
and my position was almost unbearable. He seemed 
to see no one but me, and he was snuffling all the time : 

"Pyesh — kov, you must put on a clean shirt. 
Pyesh — kov, don't make a noise with your feet. 
Pyesh — kov, your bootlaces are undone again." 

But I paid him out for his savage insolence. One 
day I took the half of a frozen watermelon, cut out 
the inside, and fastened it by a string over a pulley 
on the outer door. When the door opened the melon 
went up, but when my teacher shut the door the hol- 
low melon descended upon his bald head like a cap. 
The janitor was sent with me with a note to the head- 
master's house, and I paid for my prank with my own 
skin. 



334 M Y CHILDHOOD 

Another time I sprinkled snuff over his table, and 
he sneezed so much that he had to leave the class and 
send his brother-in-law to take his place. This was 
an officer who set the class singing: "God save the 
Czar!" and "Oh, Liberty! my Liberty!" Those who 
did not sing in tune he rapped over the head with a 
ruler, which made a funny, hollow noise, but it hurt. 

The Divinity teacher, the handsome, young, luxuri- 
ant-haired priest, did not like me because I had no 
Bible, and also because I mocked his way of speaking. 
The first thing he did when he entered the classroom 
was to ask me: 

"Pyeshkov, have you brought that book or not? 
Yes. The book!" 

"No," I answered, "I have not brought it. Yes." 

"What do you mean — yes ?" 

"No." 

"Well, you can just go home. Yes — home, for I 
don't intend to teach you. Yes! I don't intend to 
do it." 

This did not trouble me much. I went out and 
kicked my heels in the dirty village street till the end 
of the lesson, watching the noisy life about me. 

This priest had a beautiful face, like a Christ, with 
caressing eyes like a woman's, and little hands — gentle, 
like everything about him. Whatever he handled — 
a book, a ruler, a penholder, whatever it might be — 



MY CHILDHOOD 335 

he handled carefully, as if it were alive and very frag- 
ile, and as if he loved it and were afraid of spoiling it 
by touching it. He was not quite so gentle with the 
children, but all the same they loved him. 

Notwithstanding the fact that I learned tolerably 
well, I was soon told that I should be expelled from 
the school for unbecoming conduct. I became de- 
pressed, for I saw a very unpleasant time coming, as 
mother was growing more irritable every day, and beat 
me more than ever. 

But help was at hand. Bishop Khrisanph * paid 
an unexpected visit to the school. He was a little 
man, like a wizard, and, if I remember rightly, was 
humpbacked. 

Sitting at the table, looking so small in his wide 
black clothes, and with a funny hat like a little pail on 
his head, he shook his hands free from his sleeves and 
said: 

"Now, children, let us have a talk together." 

And at once the classroom became warm and bright, 
and pervaded by an atmosphere of unfamiliar pleas- 
antness. 

1 The author of the famous work, in three volumes, entitled "Re- 
ligions of the Ancient World," and the article on "Egyptian 
Metempsychosis," as well as several articles of public interest such 
as "Concerning Marriage, and Women." That last article made a 
deep impression on me when I read it in my youth. It seems to me 
that I have not remembered its title correctly, but it was published in 
some theological journal in the seventies. 



336 MY CHILDHOOD 

Calling me to the table, after many others had had 
their turns, he asked me gravely : 

"And how old are you*? Is that all? Why, what 
a tall boy you are ! I suppose you have been standing 
out in the rain pretty often, have you"? Eh?" 

Placing one dried-up hand with long, sharp nails 
on the table, and catching hold of his sparse beard with 
the fingers of the other, he placed his face, with its 
kind eyes, quite close to mine, as he said : 

"Well, now tell me which you like best of the Bible 
stories." 

When I told him that I had no Bible and did not 
learn Scripture history, he pulled his cowl straight, 
saying : 

"How is that? You know it is absolutely necessary 
for you to learn it. But perhaps you have learned 
some by listening? You know the Psalms? Good! 
And the prayers? . . . There, you see! And the 
lives of the Saints too? ... In rhyme? . . . Then I 
think you are very well up in the subject." 

At this moment our priest appeared — flushed and out 
of breath. The Bishop blessed him, but when he be- 
gan to speak about me, he raised his hand, saying : 

"Excuse me ... just a minute. . . . Now, tell 
me the story of Alexei, the man of God. 

"Fine verses those — eh, my boy?" he said, when I 
came to a full stop, having forgotten the next verse. 



MY CHILDHOOD 337 

"Let us have something else now — something about 
King David. , . . Go on, I am listening very atten- 
tively." 

I saw that he was really listening, and that the 
verses pleased him. He examined me for a long time, 
then he suddenly stood up and asked quickly: 

"You have learned the Psalms'? Who taught you? 
A good grandfather, is he? Eh? Bad? You don't 
say so! . . . But are n't you very naughty?" 

I hesitated, but at length I said : 

"Yes." 

The teacher and the priest corroborated my confes- 
sion garrulously, and he listened to them with his eyes 
cast down; then he said with a sigh: 

"You hear what they say about you? Come 
here!" 

Placing his hand, which smelt of cypress wood, on 
my head, he asked: 

"Why are you so naughty?" 

"It is so dull learning." 

"Dull? Now, my boy, that is not true. If you 
found it dull you would be a bad scholar, whereas 
your teachers testify that you are a very apt pupil. 
That means that you have another reason for being 
naughty." 

Taking a little book from his breast, he said as he 
wrote in it: 



338 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Pyeshkov, Alexei. There! . . . All the same, my 
boy, you must keep yourself in hand, and try not to 
be too naughty. . . . We will allow you to be just a 
little naughty; but people have plenty to plague them 
without that. Is n't it so, children ?" 

Many voices answered gaily: 

"Yes." 

"But I can see that you are not very naughty your- 
selves. Am I right ?" 

And the boys laughingly answered all together: 

"No. We are very naughty too — very !" 

The Bishop leaned over the back of a chair, drew 
me to him, and said surprisingly, causing us all — even 
the teacher and the priest — to laugh: 

"It is a fact, my brothers — that when I was your 
age I was very naughty too. What do you think of 
that?" 

The children laughed, and he began to ask them 
questions, adroitly contriving to muddle them, so that 
they began to answer each other; and the merriment 
redoubled. At length he stood up, saying: 

"Well, it is very nice to be with you, but it is time 
for me to go now." 

Raising his hand and throwing back his sleeve, he 
made the sign of the Cross over us all with one wide 
gesture, and blessed us: 

"In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and 



MY CHILDHOOD 339 

of the Holy Ghost, I bless you and your labors. 
Good-by!" 

They all cried : 

"Good-by, my lord. Come again soon." 

Shaking his cowl, he said : 

"I shall come again. I shall come again, and bring 
you some little books." 

And he said to the teacher as he sailed out of the 
classroom : 

"Let them go home now." 

He led me by the hand to the porch, where he said 
quietly, bending down to me: 

"So you will hold yourself in, won't you*? ... Is 
that settled? ... I understand why you are naughty, 
you know. . . . Good-by, my boy !" 

I was very excited; my heart was seething with 
strange feelings, and when the teacher, having dis- 
missed the rest of the class, kept me in to tell me 
that now I ought to be quieter than water and hum- 
bler than grass, I listened to him attentively and wil- 
lingly. 

The priest, putting on his fur-coat, chimed in gently : 

"And from to-day you will have to assist at my les- 
sons. Yes, you '11 have to. And sit still too. Yes — 
sit still." 

But while matters were improving at school, an un- 
pleasant incident occurred at home. I stole a rouble 



34o MY CHILDHOOD 

from mother. The crime had been committed without 
forethought. One evening mother went out and left 
me to keep house and mind the baby; feeling bored, I 
began to turn over the leaves of a book belonging to 
my stepfather — "The Memoirs of a Doctor," by Dumas 
Pere — and between the pages I came across two notes, 
one for ten roubles and the other for one rouble. I 
could not understand the book, so I shut it up; then it 
suddenly dawned upon me that if I had a rouble I 
could buy not only the Bible, but also the book about 
Robinson. That such a book existed I had learned at 
school not long before this. One frosty day in recrea- 
tion time, I was telling the boys a fairy-story, when 
one of them observed in a tone of contempt : 

"Fairy-tales are bosh! 'Robinson' is what I like. 
It is a true story." 

Finding several other boys who had read "Robinson" 
and were full of its praises, I felt offended at their not 
liking grandmother's stories, and made up my mind to 
read "Robinson" for myself, so that I should be able 
to tell them it was "bosh!" 

The next day I brought the Bible and two torn 
volumes of Andersen's fairy-tales to school, together 
with three pounds of white bread and a pound of sau- 
sages. In the little dark shop by the wall of Vladin- 
ursk Church there had also been a "Robinson" — a thin 
little book with a yellow cover, and a picture of a 



MY CHILDHOOD 341 

bearded man in a fur nightcap, with the skin of a wild 
beast over his shoulders, on the front page; but I did 
not like the look of it. Even the exterior of the fairy- 
tales was pleasing, in spite of their being torn. 

In the long playtime I distributed the bread and 
sausages amongst the boys, and we began to read that 
wonderful story "The Nightingale," which took all our 
hearts by storm. 

"In China all the people are Chinese, and even the 
Emperor is a Chinaman" — I remember how pleasantly 
this phrase struck me with its simple, joyful, smiling 
music. There were many other points about the story 
too which were wonderfully good. 

But I was not to be allowed to read "The Night- 
ingale" in school. There was not time enough, for 
when I returned home mother, who was standing be- 
fore the fire holding a frying-pan in which she had been 
cooking some eggs, asked me in a strange, subdued 
voice : 

"Did you take that rouble?" 

"Yes, I took it — out of that book there." 

She gave me a sound beating with the frying-pan, 
and took away Andersen's book and hid it somewhere 
so that I could never find it again, which was a far 
worse punishment to me than the beating. 

I did not go to school for several days, and during 
that time my stepfather must have told one of his 



342 MY CHILDHOOD 

friends about my exploit, who told his children, who 
carried the story to school, and when I went back I 
was met with the new cry "Thief!" 

It was a brief and clear description, but it did not 
happen to be a true one, seeing that I had not at- 
tempted to conceal the fact that it was I who had taken 
the rouble. I tried to explain this, but they did not be- 
lieve me; and when I went home I told mother that 
I was not going to school any more. 

Sitting by the window, again pregnant, with a gray 
face and distraught, weary eyes, she was feeding my 
brother Sascha, and she stared at me with her mouth 
open, like a fish. 

"You are wrong," she said quietly. "No one could 
possibly know that you took the rouble." 

"Come yourself and ask them." 

"You must have chattered about it yourself. Con- 
fess now — you told it yourself? Take care, for I 
shall find out for myself to-morrow who spread that 
story in school." 

I gave her the name of the pupil. Her face wrinkled 
pitifully and her tears began to fall. 

I went away to the kitchen and lay down on my bed, 
which consisted of a box behind the stove. I lay there 
and listened to my mother wailing: 

"My God! My God!" 

Not being able to bear the disgusting smell of greasy 



MY CHILDHOOD 343 

cloths being dried any longer, I rose and went out to 
the yard ; but mother called after me : 

"Where are you going to? Where are you going? 
Come here to me!" 

Then we sat on the floor; and Sascha lay on mother's 
knees, and taking hold of the buttons of her dress 
bobbed his head and said "boovooga," which was his 
way of saying "poogorka" (button). 

I sat pressed to mother's side, and she said, kissing 
me: 

"We ... are poor, and every kopeck . . . every 
kopeck ..." 

But she never finished what she began to say, press- 
ing me with her hot arm. 

"What trash — trash!" she exclaimed suddenly, using 
a word I had heard her use before. 

Sascha repeated: 

"T'ash!" 

He was a queer little boy; clumsily formed, with a 
large head, he looked around on everything with his 
beautiful dark blue eyes, smiling quietly, exactly as if 
he were expecting some one. He began to talk unus- 
ually early, and lived in a perpetual state of quiet hap- 
piness. He was a weakly child, and could hardly 
crawl about; and he was always very pleased to see me, 
and used to ask to be taken up in my arms, and loved 
to crush my ears in his soft little fingers, which always, 



344 MY CHILDHOOD 

somehow, smelled of violets. He died unexpectedly, 
without having been ill at all; in the morning he was 
quietly happy as usual, and in the evening, when the 
bells were ringing for vespers, he was laid out upon the 
table. This happened soon after the birth of the sec- 
ond child, Nikolai. Mother had done as she had prom- 
ised, and matters were put right for me at school, but 
I was soon involved in another scrape. 

One day, at the time of evening tea, I was coming 
into the kitchen from the yard when I heard a dis- 
tressful cry from mother: 

"Eugen, I beg you, I beg — !" 

"Non — sense!" said my stepfather. 

"But you are going to her — I know it !" 

'We— 11?" 

For some seconds they were both silent; then mother 
said, coughing: 

"What vile trash you are !" 

I heard him strike her, and rushing into the room 
I saw that mother, who had fallen on to her knees, 
was resting her back and elbows against a chair, with 
her chest forward and her head thrown back, with a 
rattling in her throat, and terribly glittering eyes; while 
he, dressed in his best, with a new overcoat, was strik- 
ing her in the chest with his long foot. I seized a 
knife from the table — a knife with a bone handle set 
in silver, which they used to cut bread with, the only 



MY CHILDHOOD 345 

thing belonging to my father which remained to mother 
— I seized it and struck with all my force at my step- 
father's side. 

By good-luck mother was in time to push Maximov 
away, and the knife going sideways tore a wide hole 
in his overcoat, and only grazed his skin. My step- 
father, gasping, rushed from the room holding his side, 
and mother seized me and lifted me up; then with a 
groan threw me on the floor. My stepfather took me 
away from her when he returned from the yard. 

Late that evening, when, in spite of everything, he 
had gone out, mother came to me behind the stove, 
gently took me in her arms, kissed me, and said, 
weeping : 

"Forgive me; it was my fault! Oh, my dear! 
How could you? . . . And with a knife . . . ?" 

I remember with perfect clearness how I said to her 
that I would kill my stepfather and myself too. And 
I think I should have done it; at any rate I should 
have made the attempt. Even now I can see that con- 
temptible long leg, in braided trousers, flung out into 
the air, and kicking a woman's breast. Many years 
later that unfortunate Maximov died before my eyes 
in a hospital. I had then become strangely attached 
to him, and I wept to see the light in his beautiful, 
roving eyes grow dim, and finally go out altogether; but 
even in that sad moment, although my heart was full 



346 MY CHILDHOOD 

of a great grief, I could not forget that he had kicked 
my mother. 

As I remember these oppressive horrors of our wild 
Russian life, I ask myself often whether it is worth 
while to speak of them. And then, with restored con- 
fidence, I answer myself — "It is worth while because 
it is actual, vile fact, which has not died out, even in 
these days — a fact which must be traced to its origin, 
and pulled up by the root from the memories, the souls 
of the people, and from our narrow, sordid lives." 

And there is another and more important reason im- 
pelling me to describe these horrors. Although they 
are so disgusting, although they oppress us and crush 
many beautiful souls to death, yet the Russian is still 
so healthy and young in heart that he can and does 
rise above them. For in this amazing life of ours not 
only does the animal side of our nature flourish and 
grow fat, but with this animalism there has grown up, 
triumphant in spite of it, bright, healthful and creative 
— a type of humanity which inspires us to look forward 
to our regeneration, to the time when we shall all live 
peacefully and humanely. 



CHAPTER XIII 

ONCE more I found myself at grandfather's. 
"Well, robber, what do you want?" were his 
words of greeting; and he accompanied them by rap- 
ping his fingers on the table. "I am not going to feed 
you any longer; let your grandmother do it." 

"And so I will," said grandmother. "Ekh! what 
ill-luck. Just think of it." 

"All right, feed him if you want to," cried grand- 
father; then growing calmer, he explained to me: 

"She and I live quite separately now; we have noth- 
ing to do with each other." 

Grandmother, sitting under the window, was mak- 
ing lace with swift movements; the shuttle snapped 
gaily, and the pillow, thickly sewn with copper pins, 
shone like a golden hedgehog in the spring sunlight. 
And grandmother herself — one would think she had 
been cast in copper — was unchanged. But grandfather 
was more wizened, more wrinkled; his sandy hair had 
grown gray, and his calm, self-important manner had 
given way to a fuming fussiness; his green eyes had 
grown dim, and had a suspicious expression. Laugh- 
ingly, grandmother told me of the division of property 

347 



348 MY CHILDHOOD 

which had taken place between herself and grandfather ; 
he had given her all the pots and pans and crockery 
ware, saying: 

"Here is your little lot, and don't you ask me for 
anything else." 

Thereupon he took all her old clothes and things, 
including a cloak of fox fur, and sold them for seven 
hundred roubles, and put the money out at interest to 
his Jew godson, the fruit merchant. Finally the mal- 
ady of avarice fastened upon him, and he became lost 
to shame; he began to go about amongst his old ac- 
quaintances, his former colleagues, rich merchants, and 
complaining that he had been ruined by his children, 
would ask for money to help him in his poverty. He 
profited by their regard for him, for they gave to him 
generously — large sums in notes which he flourished 
boastfully in grandmother's face, taunting her, like a 
child: 

"Look, fool, they won't give you a hundredth part of 
that." 

The money which he obtained in this way he put 
out at interest with a new friend of his — a tall, bald 
furrier called, in the village, Khlist (a horsewhip), 
and his sister, a shopkeeper — a fat, red-cheeked woman 
with brown eyes, dark and sweet like virgin-honey. 

All expenses in the house were carefully divided: 
one day the dinner was prepared by grandmother from 



MY CHILDHOOD 349 

provisions bought with her own money; and the next 
day it was grandfather who provided the food — and 
his dinners were never as good as hers, for grandmother 
bought good meat while he bought such stuff as liver 
and lights and scraps of meat. They each had their 
own store of tea and sugar, but the tea was brewed in 
the same teapot, and grandfather would say anxiously : 

"Wait! Wait a moment! . . . How much have 
you put in?" 

Shaking the tea-leaves out on to his palm, he would 
carefully measure them out, saying : 

"Your tea is finer than mine, so I ought to put in 
less, as mine is a large leaf." 

He was very particular that grandmother should 
pour out his tea and her own both equally strong, and 
that she should fill her cup only as often as he filled 
his. 

"What about the last one?" she asked, just before 
she had poured out all the tea. 

Grandfather looked into the teapot and said : 

"There 's plenty there — for the last one." 

Even the oil for the image-lamp he bought separ- 
ately — and this after fifty years of united labor! 

These tricks of grandfather amused and disgusted 
me at the same time, but to grandmother they were 
simply funny. 

"You be quiet!" she would say pacifyingly to me. 



350 MY CHILDHOOD 

"What of it? He is an old, old man, and he is get- 
ting silly; that's all. He must be eighty, or not far 
off it. Let him play the fool; what harm does it do 
any one? And I will do a little work for myself and 
you — never mind !" 

I also began to earn a little money; in the holidays, 
early in the morning, I took a bag and went about the 
yards and streets collecting bones, rags, paper and 
nails. Rag-merchants would give two greevin (twenty 
kopecks) for a pood (forty pounds) of rags and paper, 
or iron, and ten or eight kopecks for a pood of bones. 
I did this work on week days after school too, and on 
Saturdays I sold articles at thirty kopecks or half a 
rouble each, and sometimes more if I was lucky. 
Grandmother took the money away from me and put it 
quickly into the pocket of her skirt, and praised me, 
looking down: 

"There! Thank you, my darling. This will do 
for our food. . . . You have done very well." 

One day I saw her holding five kopecks of mine in 
her hands, looking at them, and quietly crying; and 
one muddy tear hung from the tip of her spongy, 
pumicestone-like nose. 

A more profitable game than rag-picking was the 
theft of logs and planks from the timber-yards on the 
banks of the Oka, or on the Island of Pesk, where, in 
fair time, iron was bought and sold in hastily built 



MY CHILDHOOD 351 

booths. After the fairs the booths used to be taken 
down, but the poles and planks were stowed away in 
the boathouses, and remained there till close on the 
time of the spring floods. A small houseowner would 
give ten kopecks for a good plank, and it was possible 
to steal two a day. But for the success of the under- 
taking, bad weather was essential, when a snowstorm 
or heavy rains would drive the watchmen to hide them- 
selves under cover. 

I managed to pick up some friendly accomplices — 
one ten-year-old son of a Morduan beggar, Sanka 
Vyakhir, a kind, gentle boy always tranquilly happy; 
kinless Kostrom, lanky and lean, with tremendous 
black eyes, who in his thirteenth year was sent to a 
colony of young criminals for stealing a pair of doves ; 
the little Tartar Khabi, a twelve-year-old "strong 
man," simple-minded and kind; blunt-nosed Yaz, the 
son of a graveyard watchman and grave-digger, a boy 
of eight, taciturn as a fish, and suffering from epilepsy; 
and the eldest of all was the son of a widowed dress- 
maker, Grishka Tchurka, a sensible, straightforward 
boy, who was terribly handy with his fists. We all 
lived in the same street. 

Theft was not counted as a crime in our village; 
it had become a custom, and was practically the only 
means the half-starved natives had of getting a live- 
lihood. Fairs lasting a month and a half would not 



352 MY CHILDHOOD 

keep them for a whole year, and many respectable 
householders "did a little work on the river" — catch- 
ing logs and planks which were borne along by the 
tide, and carrying them off separately or in small loads 
at a time; but the chief form this occupation took was 
that of thefts from barges, or in a general prowling 
up and down the Volga or Oka on the lookout for any- 
thing which was not properly secured. The grown-up 
people used to boast on Sundays of their successes, and 
the youngsters listened and learned. 

In the springtime, during the spell of heat before 
the fair, when the village streets were full of drunken 
workmen, cabmen, and all classes of working folk, the 
village children used to rummage in their pockets. 
This was looked upon as legitimate business, and they 
carried it on under the very eyes of their elders. They 
stole his tools from the carpenter, the keys from the 
heedless cabman, the harness from the dray-horse, and 
the iron from the axles of the cart. But our little 
band did not engage in that sort of thing. Tchurka 
announced one day in a tone of decision : 

"I am not going to steal. Mamka does not allow 
it." 

"And I am afraid to," said Khabi. 

Kostrom was possessed by an intense dislike for the 
little thieves; he pronounced the word "thieves" with 



MY CHILDHOOD 353 

peculiar force, and when he saw strange children pick- 
ing the pockets of tipsy men he drove them away, and 
if he happened to catch one of them he gave him a 
good beating. This large-eyed, unhappy-looking boy 
imagined himself to be grown-up; he walked with a 
peculiar gait, sideways, just like a porter, and tried to 
speak in a thick, gruff voice, and was very reserved and 
self-possessed, like an old man. 

Vyakhir believed that to steal was to sin. 

But to take planks and poles from Pesk, that was 
not accounted a sin; none of us were afraid of that, 
and we so ordered matters as to make it very easy 
to succeed. Some evening, when it was beginning to 
grow dark, or by day, if it was bad weather, Vyakhir 
and Yaz set out for Pesk, crossing the creek by the wet 
ice. They went openly, for the purpose of drawing 
on themselves the attention of the watchmen, while 
we four crossed over separately without being seen. 
While the watchmen, suspicious of Yaz and Vyakhir, 
were occupied in watching them, we betook ourselves 
to the boathouse, which we had fixed upon beforehand, 
chose something to carry off, and while our fleet-footed 
companions were teasing the watchmen, and luring 
them to pursuit, we made off home. Each one of us 
had a piece of string with a large nail, bent like a hook, 
at the end of it, which we fastened in the plank or pole, 



354 MY CHILDHOOD 

and thus were able to drag it across the snow and ice. 
The watchmen hardly ever saw us, and if they did see 
us they were never able to overtake us. 

When we had sold our plunder we divided the gains 
into six shares, which sometimes came to as much as 
five or seven kopecks each. On that money it was pos- 
sible to live very comfortably for a day, but Vyakhir's 
mother beat him if he did not bring her something for 
a glass of brandy or a little drop of vodka. Kostrom 
was saving his money, dreaming of the establishment 
of a pigeon-hunt. The mother of Tchurka was ill, so 
he tried to work as much as possible. Khabi also 
saved his money, with the object of returning to his 
native town, whence he had been brought by his uncle 
who had been drowned at Nijni soon after his arrival. 
Khabi had forgotten what the town was called; all he 
remembered was that it stood on the Kama, close by 
the Volga. For some reason we always made fun of this 
town, and we used to tease the cross-eyed Tartar by 
singing: 

"On the Kama a town there is, 
But nobody knows where it is! 
Our hands to it will never reach, 
Our feet to find it we cannot teach." 

At first Khabi used to get angry with us, but one 
day Vyakhir said to him in his cooing voice, which 
justified his nickname: 



MY CHILDHOOD 355 

"What is the matter with you? Surely you are not 
angry with your comrades." 

The Tartar was ashamed of himself, and after that 
he used to join us in singing about the town on the 
Kama. 

But all the same we preferred picking up rags and 
bones to stealing planks. The former was particu- 
larly interesting in the springtime, when the snow had 
melted, and after the rain had washed the street pave- 
ments clean. There, by the place where the fair was 
held, we could always pick up plenty of nails and pieces 
of iron in the gutter, and occasionally we found cop- 
per and silver coins; but to propitiate the watchman, 
so that he would not chase us away or seize our sacks, 
we had to give him a few kopecks or make profound 
obeisances to him. But we found it no easy task to 
get money. Nevertheless, we got on very well to- 
gether, and though we sometimes disputed a little 
amongst ourselves, I do not remember that we ever had 
one serious quarrel. 

Our peacemaker was Vyakhir, who always had some 
simple words ready, exactly suited to the occasion, 
which astonished us and put us to shame. He uttered 
them himself in a tone of astonishment. Yaz's spite- 
ful sallies neither offended nor upset him; in his opinion 
everything bad was unnecessary, and he would reject 
it calmly and convincingly. 



356 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Well, what is the use of it?" he would ask, and 
we saw clearly that it was no use. 

He called his mother "my Morduan," and we did 
not laugh at him. 

"My Morduan rolled home tipsy again last evening," 
he would tell us gaily, flashing his round, gold-colored 
eyes. "She kept the door open, and sat on the step 
and sang — like a hen." 

"What did she sing?" asked Tchurka, who liked to 
be precise. 

Vyakhir, slapping his hands on his knees, reproduced 
his mother's song in a thin voice : 

"Shepherd, tap thy window small, 
Whilst we run about the mall; 
Tap, tap again, quick bird of night, 
With piping music, out of sight, 
On the village cast thy spell." 

He knew many passionate songs like this, and sang 
them very well. 

"Yes," he continued, "so she went to sleep on the 
doorstep, and the room got so cold I was shivering 
from head to foot, and got nearly frozen to death; 
but she was too heavy for me to drag her in. I 
said to her this morning, 'What do you mean by get- 
ting so dreadfully drunk?' 'Oh,' she said, c it is all 
right. Bear with me a little longer. I shall soon be 
dead.' 



MY CHILDHOOD 357 

"She will soon be dead," repeated Tchurka, in a se- 
rious tone. "She is already dropsical." 

"Would you be sorry*?" I asked. 

"Of course I should," exclaimed Vyakhir, astonished. 
"She is all right with me, you know." 

And all of us, although we knew that the Morduan 
beat Vyakhir continually, believed that she was "all 
right," and sometimes even, when we had had a bad 
day, Tchurka would suggest: 

"Let us put our kopecks together to buy Vyakhir's 
mother some brandy, or she will beat him." 

The only ones in our company who could read and 
write were Tchurka and I. Vyakhir greatly envied us, 
and would murmur, as he took himself by his pointed, 
mouse-like ears: 

"As soon as my Morduan is buried I shall go to 
school too. I shall go on my knees to the teacher and 
beg him to take me, and when I have finished learning 
I will go as gardener to the Archbishop, or perhaps to 
the Emperor himself." 

In the spring the Morduan, in company with an old 
man, who was a collector for a church building-fund, 
and a bottle of vodka, was crushed by the fall of a 
wood-stack; they took the woman to the hospital, and 
practical Tchurka said to Vyakhir: 

"Come and live with me, and my mother will teach 
you to read and write." 



358 MY CHILDHOOD 

And in a very short time Vyakhir, holding his head 
high, could read the inscription : "Grocery Store," only 
he read "Balakeinia," and Tchurka corrected him: 

"Bakaleinia, my good soul." 

"I know — but the letters jump about so. They 
jump because they are pleased that they are being 
read." 

He surprised us all, and made us laugh very much 
by his love of trees and grass. The soil of the village 
was sandy and vegetation was scanty — in some of the 
yards stood a miserable willow tree, or some straggling 
elder bushes, or a few gray, dry blades of grass hid 
themselves timidly under a fence — but if one of us sat 
on them, Vyakhir would cry angrily : 

"Why must you sit on the grass ? Why don't you 
sit on the gravel'? It is all the same to you, is n't it?" 

In his opinion there was no sense in breaking off 
branches from the willow, or plucking elder flowers, or 
cutting weeping willow twigs on the banks of the Oka ; 
he always expressed great surprise when we did this, 
shrugged his shoulders, and spread out his hands: 

"Why on earth do you want to break everything 4 ? 
Look what you have done, you devils!" And before 
his astonishment we were ashamed. 

We had contrived a very merry game for Satur- 
days, and we were preparing for it all the week by 
collecting all the troddendown bast shoes we could 



MY CHILDHOOD 359 

find and storing them in convenient corners. Then on 
Saturday evening when the Tartar porters came home 
from the Siberian ports, we took up a position at the 
cross-roads and pelted the Tartars with shoes. 

At first this used to irritate them, and they ran after 
us, and abused us ; but the game soon began to interest 
them, and knowing what they might expect they ap- 
peared on the field of battle also armed with a quan- 
tity of bast shoes, and what is more, they found out 
where we kept our war materials and stole them. We 
made a complaint about this — "It is not playing the 
game !" Then they divided the shoes, giving us half, 
and the fight began. Generally they drew themselves 
up in an open place, in the middle of the cross-roads, 
and with yells we ran round them, hurling the shoes. 
They also yelled, and laughed loud enough to deafen 
any one when one of us buried his head in the sand, hav- 
ing been thrown down by a shoe adroitly hurled under 
his feet. 

This game would be carried on with zest for a long 
time, sometimes till it was nearly dark; and the in- 
habitants used to gather round, or watch us from cor- 
ners, and grumble, because they thought it was the 
right thing to do. The dusty shoes flew about like 
crows in the damp air; sometimes one of us was hit 
hard, but the pleasure of the game was greater than 
pain or injury. 



360 MY CHILDHOOD 

The Tartars were not less keen on it than we were; 
often when we had finished playing we went with 
them to an eating-house where they fed us with a spe- 
cial sweet kind of preserve made with fruit, and after 
supper we drank thick, brick-colored tea, with sweet- 
meats. We liked these people, whose strength matched 
their great size; there was something about them so 
childlike and transparent. The points which most 
struck me about them were their meekness, their un- 
wavering good-nature, and their grave, impressive re- 
spect for each other. 

They all laughed so heartily that the tears ran down 
their faces; and one of them, a native of Kassimov, 
with a broken nose, was a man renowned for his 
strength. One day he carried, from a barge which 
was at some distance from the shore, a bell weighing 
twenty-seven poods, and he roared out laughing as he 
cried: "Voo! Voo!" 

One day he made Vyakhir sit on the palm of his 
hand, and lifting him on high, he said : 

"Look where you are living now, right up in the 
sky." 

In bad weather we used to assemble at Yaz's home, 
in the burial-ground, where his father's lodge was. 
This father was an individual with hoisted bones, long 
arms, and a small head; mud-colored hair grew on his 
face. His head looked like a burdock set on his long, 



MY CHILDHOOD 361 

thin neck, as on a stalk. He had a delightful way of 
half closing his yellow eyes and muttering rapidly : 

"God give us rest. Ouch !" 

We bought three zolotniks of tea, eight portions of 
sugar, some bread, and, of course, a portion of vodka 
for Yaz's father, who was sternly ordered about by 
Tchurka : 

"Good for nothing peasant, get the samovar ready." 

The peasant laughed and prepared the tin samovar; 
and while we discussed business as we waited for tea 
to be ready, he gave us good advice : 

"Look here! The day after to-morrow is the 
month's mind of Trusov, and there will be some feast- 
ing going on there. . . . There 's a place to pick up 
bones." 

"The cook collects all the bones at Trusov's," ob- 
served Tchurka, who knew everything. 

Vyakhir said dreamily, as he looked out of the win- 
dow on the graveyard: 

"We shall soon be able to go out to the woods." 

Yaz was always silent, looking at us all expres- 
sively with his sad eyes. In silence he showed us his 
toys — wooden soldiers which he had found in a rub- 
bish pit, horses without legs, pieces of copper, and but- 
tons. 

His father set the table with cups and saucers of 
various patterns, and brought in the samovar. Kos- 



362 MY CHILDHOOD 

trom sat down to pour out tea, and he, when he had 
drunk his vodka, climbed on the stove, and stretching 
out his long neck, surveyed us with vinous eyes, and 
muttered : 

"Ouch ! So you must take your ease, as if you were 
not little boys at all, eh? Ach! thieves ... God 
give us rest !" 

Vyakhir said to him: 

"We are not thieves at all." 

"Well— little thieves then." 

If Yaz's father became too tiresome, Tchurka cried 

angrily : 

"Be quiet, you trashy peasant!" 
Vyakhir, Tchurka and I could not bear to hear the 
man counting up the number of houses which contained 
people in ill-health, or trying to guess how many of 
the villagers would die soon; he spoke so calculatingly 
and pitilessly, and seeing that what he said was objec- 
tionable to us, he purposely teased and tormented us: 

"Oh, so you are afraid, young masters *? Well, well ! 
And before long a certain stout person will die— ekh! 
And long may he rot in his grave !" 

We tried to stop him, but he would not leave off. 

"And, you know, you've got to die too; you can't 
live long in this cesspool !" 

"Well," said Vyakhir, "that's all right; and when 
we die they will make angels of us." 



MY CHILDHOOD 363 

"Yo — u?" exclaimed Yaz's father, catching his 
breath in amazement. "You"? Angels'?" 

He chuckled, and then began to tease us again by 
telling us disgusting stories about dead people. 

But sometimes this man began to talk in a murmur, 
lowering his voice strangely: 

"Listen, children . . . wait a bit ! The day before 
yesterday they buried a female . . . and I knew her 
history, children. . . . What do you think the woman 
was?" 

He often spoke about women, and always obscenely ; 
yet there was something appealing and plaintive about 
his stories — he invited us to share his thoughts, as it 
were — and we listened to him attentively. He spoke 
in an ignorant and unintelligent manner, frequently 
interrupting his speech by questions ; but his stories al- 
ways left some disturbing splinters or fragments in 
one's memory. 

"They ask her : Who set the place on fire ?' T did !' 
'How can that be, foolish woman, when you were not 
at home that night, but lying ill in the hospital?' T 
set the place on fire.' That's the way she kept on. 
. . . Why? Ouch! God give us rest." 

He knew the life story of nearly every female in- 
habitant of the place who had been buried by him in 
that bare, melancholy graveyard, and it seemed as if 
he were opening the doors of houses, which we entered, 



364 MY CHILDHOOD 

and saw how the occupiers lived; and it made us feel 
serious and important. He would have gone on talk- 
ing all night till the morning apparently, but as soon 
as the lodge window grew cloudy, and the twilight 
closed in upon it, Tchurka rose from the table and 
said: 

"I am going home, or Mamka will be frightened. 
Who is coming with me?" 

We all went away then. Yaz conducted us to the 
fence, closed the gate after us, and pressing his dark, 
bony face against the grating, said in a thick voice: 

"Good-by." 

We called out "Good-by" to him too. It was al- 
ways hard to leave him in the graveyard. Kostrom 
said one day, looking back: 

"We shall come and ask for him one day — and he 
will be dead." 

"Yaz has a worse life than any of us," Tchurka 
said frequently; but Vyakhir always rejoined: 

"We don't have a bad time — any of us !" 

And when I look back I see that we did not have 
a bad time. That independent life so full of contrasts 
was very attractive to me, and so were my comrades, 
who inspired me with a desire to be always doing them 
a good turn. 

My life at school had again become hard; the pu- 
pils nicknamed me "The Ragman" and "The Tramp," 



MY CHILDHOOD 365 

and one day, after a quarrel, they told the teacher that 
I smelt like a drain, and that they could not sit beside 
me. I remember how deeply this accusation cut me, 
and how hard it was for me to go to school after it. 
The complaint had been made up out of malice. I 
washed very thoroughly every morning, and I never 
went to school in the clothes I wore when I was col- 
lecting rags. 

However, in the end I passed the examination for 
the third class, and received as prizes bound copies of 
the Gospels and the 'Tables of Krilov," and another 
book unbound which bore the unintelligible title of 
"Fata-Morgana" ; they also gave me some sort of 
laudatory certificates. When I took my presents home, 
grandfather was delighted, and announced his intention 
of taking the books away from me and locking them 
up in his box. But grandmother had been lying ill 
for several days, penniless, and grandfather continually 
sighed and squeaked out: "You will eat me out of 
house and home. Ugh! You!' 1 so I took the books 
to a little shop, where I sold them for fifty-five kopecks, 
and gave the money to grandmother; as to the cer- 
tificates I spoiled them by scribbling over them, and 
then handed them to grandfather, who took them with- 
out turning them over, and so put them away, with- 
out noticing the mischief I had done, but I paid for it 
later on. 



366 MY CHILDHOOD 

As school had broken up I began to live in the 
streets once more, and I found it better than ever. 

It was in the middle of spring, and money was 
earned easily; on Sundays the whole company of us 
went out into the fields, or into the woods, where the 
foliage was fresh and young, early in the morning, 
and did not return till late in the evening, pleasantly 
tired, and drawn together closer than ever. 

But this form of existence did not last long. My 
stepfather, dismissed for getting into debt, had dis- 
appeared again, and mother came back to grand- 
father, with my little brother Nikolai, and I had to 
be nurse, for grandmother had gone to live at the 
house of a rich merchant in the town, where she worked 
at stitching shrouds. 

Mother was so weak and anemic that she could 
hardly walk, and she had a terrible expression in her 
eyes as she looked about her. My brother was scrofu- 
lous, and covered with painful ulcers, and so weak 
that he could not even cry aloud and only whimpered 
when he was hungry. When he had been fed he slum- 
bered, breathing with a strange sound like the soft 
mewing of a kitten. 

Observing him attentively, grandfather said : 

"He ought to have plenty of good food; but I have 
not got enough to feed you all." 



MY CHILDHOOD 367 

Mother, sitting on the bed in the corner, sighed, and 
said in a hoarse voice: 

"He does not want much." 

"A little for one and a little for another soon mounts 
up." 

He waved his hand as he turned to me: 

"Nikolai must be kept out in the sun — in some 
sand." 

I dragged out a sack of clean sand, turned it out in 
a heap in a place where the sun was full on it, and 
buried my brother in it up to his neck, as grandfather 
told me. The little boy loved sitting in the sand; 
he cooed sweetly, and flashed his bright eyes upon me 
— extraordinary eyes they were, without whites, just 
blue pupils surrounded by brilliant rings. 

I became attached to my little brother at once. It 
seemed to me that he understood all my thoughts as I 
lay beside him on the sand under the window, whence 
the sound of grandfather's shrill voice proceeded: 

"If he dies — and he won't have much difficulty 
about it — you will have a chance to live." 

Mother answered by a long fit of coughing. 

Getting his hands free, the little boy held them out 
to me, shaking his small white head; he had very little 
hair, and what there was was almost gray, and his tiny 
face had an old and wise expression. If a hen or a 



368 MY CHILDHOOD 

cat came near us Kolai would gaze at it for a long 
time, then he would look at me and smile almost sig- 
nificantly. That smile of his disturbed me. Was it 
possible that he felt that I found it dull being with 
him, and was longing to run out to the street and leave 
him there? 

The yard was small, close, and dirty; from the 
gate were built a succession of sheds and cellars ending 
at the washhouse. All the roofs were made of pieces 
of old boats — logs, boards, and damp bits of wood 
which had been secured by the inhabitants of the 
neighborhood when the ice was breaking on the Oka, 
or at flood-time — and the whole yard was an unsightly 
conglomeration of heaps of wood of all sorts, which, 
being saturated with water, sweated in the sun and 
emitted an intensified odor of rottenness. 

Next door there was a slaughter-house for the 
smaller kind of cattle, and almost every morning could 
be heard the bellowing of calves and the bleating of 
sheep, and the smell of blood became so strong some- 
times that it seemed to me that it hovered in the air 
in the shape of a transparent, purple net. 

When the animals bellowed as the butt-end of the 
ax struck them between the horns, Kolai would blink 
and blow out his lips, as if he wanted to imitate the 
sound; but all he could do was to breathe: 

"Phoo . . ." 



MY CHILDHOOD 369 

At midday grandfather, putting his head out of the 
window, would call: 

"Dinner!" 

He used to feed the child himself, holding him on 
his knees, pressing potatoes and bread into Kolai's 
mouth, and smearing them all over his thin lips and 
pointed chin. When he had given him a little food 
grandfather would lift up the little boy's shirt, poke 
his swollen stomach with his fingers, and debate with 
himself aloud : 

"Will that do? Or must I give him some more?" 

Then my mother's voice would be heard, proceeding 
from her dark corner : 

"Look at him! He is reaching for the bread." 

"Stupid child! How can he possibly know how 
much he ought to eat?" And again he gave Kolai 
something to chew. 

I used to feel ashamed when I looked on at this feed- 
ing business; a lump seemed to rise in my throat and 
make me feel sick. 

"That will do," grandfather would say, at length. 
"Take him to his mother." 

I took Kolai; he wailed and stretched his hands out 
to the table. Mother, raising herself with difficulty, 
came to meet me, holding out her hideously dry, flesh- 
less arms, so long and thin — just like branches broken 
off a Christmas-tree. 



370 MY CHILDHOOD 

She had become almost dumb, hardly ever utter- 
ing a word in that passionate voice of hers, but lying 
in silence all day long in her corner — slowly dying. 
That she was dying I felt, I knew — yes. And grand- 
father spoke too often, in his tedious way, of death, 
especially in the evening, when it grew dark in the 
yard, and a smell of rottenness, warm and woolly, like 
a sheep's fleece, crept in at the window. 

Grandfather's bed stood in the front corner, al- 
most under the image, and he used to lie there with 
his head towards it and the window, and mutter for a 
long time in the darkness: 

"Well — the time has come for us to die. How 
shall we stand before our God? What shall we say 
to Him? All our life we have been struggling. 
What have we done? And with what object have we 
done it?" 

I slept on the floor between the stove and the win- 
dow ; I had not enough room, so I had to put my feet 
in the oven, and the cockroaches used to tickle them. 
This corner afforded me not a little malicious enjoy- 
ment, for grandfather was continually breaking the 
window with the end of the oven-rake, or the poker, 
during his cooking operations ; and it was very comical 
to see, and very strange, I thought, that any one so 
clever as grandfather should not think of cutting down 
the rake. 



MY CHILDHOOD 371 

One day when there was something boiling in a 
pot on the fire he was in a hurry, and he used the 
rake so carelessly that he broke the window-frame, 
two panes of glass, and upset the saucepan on the 
hearth and broke it. The old man was in such a rage 
that he sat on the floor and cried. 

"OLord! OLord!" 

That day, when he had gone out, I took a bread 
knife and cut the oven-rake down to a quarter or a 
third of its size; but when grandfather saw what I 
had done, he scolded me: 

"Cursed devil! It ought to have been sawn 
through with a saw. We might have made rolling- 
pins out of the end, and sold them, you devil's 
spawn !" 

Throwing his arms about wildly, he ran out of the 
door, and mother said : 

"You ought not to have meddled . . ." 

She died one Sunday in August about midday. My 
stepfather had only just returned from his travels, 
and had obtained a post somewhere. Grandmother 
had taken Kolai to him — to a newly done-up flat near 
the station, and mother was to be carried there in a 
few days. 

In the morning of the day of her death she said to 
me in a low but a lighter and clearer voice than I had 
heard from her lately : 



372 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Go to Eugen Vassilev, and ask him to come to 
me." 

Lifting herself up in bed by pressing her hands 
against the wall, she added: 

"Run— quickly!" 

I thought she was smiling, and that there was a 
new light in her eyes. 

My stepfather was at Mass, and grandmother sent 
me to get some snuff for her; there was no prepared 
snuff at hand, so I had to wait while the shopkeeper 
got it, then I took it back to grandmother. 

When I returned to grandfather's, mother was sit- 
ting at the table dressed in a clean, lilac-colored frock, 
with her hair prettily dressed, and looking as splendid 
as she used to look. 

"You are feeling better?" I asked, with a feeling 
of inexplicable fear. 

Looking at me fixedly, she said: 

"Come here! Where have you been? Eh?" 

Before I had time to reply, she seized me by the 
hair, and grasping in her other hand a long, flexible 
knife, made out of a saw, she flourished it several times 
and struck me with the flat of it. It slipped from 
her hands to the floor. 

"Pick it up and give it to me. . . ." 

I picked up the knife and threw it on the table, and 
mother pushed me away from her. I sat on the ledge 



MY CHILDHOOD 373 

of the stove and watched her movements in a state 
of terror. 

Rising from the chair she slowly made her way to- 
wards her own corner, lay down on the bed, and wiped 
her perspiring face with a handkerchief. Her hands 
moved uncertainly; twice she missed her face and 
touched the pillow instead. 

"Give me some water. ..." 

I scooped some water out of a pail with a cup, and 
lifting her head with difficulty, she drank a little. 
Then she pushed my hand away with her cold hand, 
and drew a deep breath. Then after looking at the 
corner where the icon was, she turned her eyes on me, 
moved her lips as if she were smiling, and slowly let 
her long lashes droop over her eyes. Her elbows were 
pressed closely against her sides, and her hands, on 
which the fingers were weakly twitching, crept about 
her chest, moving towards her throat. A shadow fell 
upon her face, invading every part of it, staining the 
skin yellow, sharpening the nose. Her mouth was 
open as if she were amazed at something, but her 
breathing was not audible. I stood, for how long I 
do not know, by my mother's bedside, with the cup in 
my hand, watching her face grow frozen and gray. 

When grandfather came in I said to him: 

"Mother is dead." 

He glanced at the bed. 



374 MY CHILDHOOD 

"Why are you telling lies?" 

He went to the stove and took out the pie, rattling 
the dampers deafeningly. 

I looked at him, knowing that mother was dead, and 
waiting for him to find it out. 

My stepfather came in dressed in a sailor's pea- 
jacket, with a white cap. He noiselessly picked up a 
chair and took it over to mother's bed, when suddenly 
he let it fall with a crash to the floor and cried in a 
loud voice, like a trumpet : 

"Yes— she is dead ! Look !" 

Grandfather, with wide-open eyes, softly moved 
away from the stove with the damper in his hand, 
stumbling like a blind man. 

A few days after my mother's funeral, grandfather 
said to me : 

"Now, Lexei — you must not hang round my neck. 
There is no room for you here. You will have to go 
out into the world." 

And so I went out into the world. 



THE END 



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